


Rivers in your Mouth

by tameimpala



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Case Fic, Drowning, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, Kid Winchesters, Pre-Series, Protective Dean Winchester, Protective John Winchester, Protective Sam Winchester, Wordcount: 30.000-50.000, Young Dean Winchester, Young Sam Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-25
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-07-18 06:23:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 32,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7303078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tameimpala/pseuds/tameimpala
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Hold it in love, the river in your mouth is pouring out...</i>
</p><p>A seedy podunk town, a strange run in with a local who appears at the Impala's window, and Sam constantly voicing his disdain for the place they've only just driven into- they all should have set off warning bells in John Winchester's head....</p><p>He soon comes to regret leaving his two boys behind in rundown motel to hunt something that has, unbeknownst to them all, marked his eldest son.</p><p> <span class="small"><b>Pre-Series:</b> Dean is 9 and Sam is 5</span></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. We Will Never be the Change to the Weather and the Sea

**Author's Note:**

> The title of this fic comes from the song of the same name by **Ben Howard**  
> 
> 
> Enjoy!

  


*

**1988**

Red River, Minnesota

#  ________________

  


  


It had to be one of the most squalid, fleabag ridden towns John Winchester had ever had the misfortune to visit. And he'd spent time in plenty of squalid, fleabag ridden towns over the past five years... 

  


_Three days,_ he told himself. _Four days tops and we’re out of here._

  


Glancing in his rear view mirror he saw his two sons sitting in the back of the car, both busy with their respective activities. Sam was scribbling furiously with his worn down crayons in a battered up coloring book. As soon as they had drove past the graffitied sign that welcomed them to the ominous sounding town of Red River (a place that could, according to a spray painted message, kiss some joker called Tommo's ass) his youngest son informed him that he didn't like it here. 

After around the 6th time Sam had pointed this out John had grown tired of trying to reassure him and eventually barked back harshly at him to: _"Shut the hell up Sammy and deal with it."._

Sam had been angrily drawing in his book ever since. Dean on the other hand was staring out at the world outside of the 67’ Chevrolet Impala. He couldn’t read the expression on his older son’s face, but then again he never really could. Dean was interested in what his father wanted him to be interested in, he was interested in what Sammy wanted him to be interested in. But as for what the 9 year old truly wanted for himself John didn’t know, he was always faced with that unreadable expression that obeyed his father’s every order yet was curiously missing something essential… Some tiny piece the boy must have hidden away a while ago when John hadn't been looking, perhaps when his mother had burned alongside their home and the happy normal lives Mary had wanted for their two sons.

The breeze from Dean’s open window made his darkening blond hair ripple, a last reminder of John’s wife. The spiky tresses stilled as the jet-black car pulled to up to a red light.

“You okay back there?” He called to them, wanting Dean to look away from the window and for Sam to stop scribbling like a goddamn maniac.

  


Just as Dean started to turn his head to answer a shape appeared at his door and deep slurring voice emitted from it...

  


“Spare any change kid? Come on I’m sure you’ve got some on ya.” A wizened old hand reached in through the Impala’s open window. 

The smell hit all three of them hard, a dirty rotten stench that reminded John of saltwater and filth. Dean stared down at the stranger's hand in shock as it moved towards his pocket, his green eyes followed the arm up to it’s owners face and discovered that it belonged to an equally wrinkled bearded man. The skin over his left eye drooped down as if it were missing an eyeball and he bared his yellow teeth in a leering grin. Sam dropped his coloring book and promptly started yelling at the top of his lungs. Dean barely even registered his brother's screams as he was so frozen in his own fear. The older boy stayed as still as a wax figure, his eyes were the only part of him that could move- he glanced back down and spotted a glimpse of silver in that gnarled calloused hand, noted a minuscule shift of weight in his coat pocket... 

  


But Dean had nothing in his pockets.

At least he hadn't before that man had appeared.

  


Before he knew it the hand had disappeared and his father’s seat was empty.

His body registered the disappearance of the ancient stranger and it was like Dean's paralysis had been lifted. He quickly shifted in his seat to lean out of the open window and instantly saw John holding the man against the car with his forearm, pressing down hard on his wind pipe.

“What the _hell_ do you think you’re doing?” John hissed venomously into his face, barely registering the overwhelming smell of mildew in his all encompassing rage or that the elderly guy’s coat felt strangely damp despite it being a dry clear day.

“C-calm down pal!” The old man croaked, “Just need-ed some change!”

“From a 9 year old? Come on!” He tightened his grip and didn’t even give a slightest shit about the hocking of horns sounding off behind him.

“S-Sorry pal I’m sorry!” His creased face was turning a deep red. Suddenly sense started to bleed into John’s irate skull, not wanting to suffocate the man in broad day light he threw him from the car and was actually impressed that a guy of his age managed to stay on his feet.

“God! You almost killed me man!!” He readjusted his filthy jacket and knelt down so he could peer back into the car, “Sorry for scaring ya kiddos.” 

John stepped in front of the window, blocking the man’s view of his children and watched as he lifted his old hands placatingly and stalked off to a nearby alley.

The hunter took a deep steadying breath as he watched the man disappear from sight and then quickly got back into the car and floored the gas pedal, his hands clutched onto the steering wheel as he willed them to stop shaking.

“Roll your fucking window up Dean.” John barked at his son, trying and failing to swallow his anger. Before he knew it he launched into a full tirade as parents do when their child has been in danger, the usual lines of _never do that again_ and _do you know what could have happened?_. Except John's tirades were ten times worse. 

It wasn’t remotely Dean’s fault, he knew that, but he needed to release the intense fear he’d felt when a stranger approached their car and reached for his son. 

Yet the stranger was gone, now all he had left was Dean to direct his anger at.

“What if he’d grabbed Sammy? Or opened the door and pulled you out? He could have easily pulled the child lock up with the window all the way down! My God Dean how can I trust you on your own with Sam if you can’t even keep a damn _window_ closed?”

Dean sagged in his seat, his arms crossed and his head hanging low. He knew it was a low blow bringing Sam into this, his younger brother was actually currently trying his best to comfort Dean by reaching out a hand to touch his shoulder. Dean wriggled away from it and returned to glaring blankly out of the now firmly closed window.

“You were hurting that old man.” Said Sam in a small clipped voice, directing his attention to John in the wake of Dean’s stroppiness.

John sighed and gripped the steering wheel even tighter as if by sheer force of will he could change it into that man's shrivelled old throat, “Yes I was Sammy, because god knows what he could have done to your brother. Which one would you prefer, me hurting that guy or him hurting Dean?” Using them against each other… He wasn’t proud but it was an effective way of keeping them both in line.

“But he didn’t hurt him though.” 

“Well you sure as hell thought he was going to by the way you were screaming.” John bit back as he swiftly jerked the steering wheel and took a right turn into a grubby looking motel parking lot, earning another honk from the car behind him and a yell of _“Asshole!”_ as they drove past them.

“He looked scary!” Sam protested, as if that explained everything. “You were scary too.” He added in an undertone as he reached for his coloring book again.

John sat for second as those four words sunk in. He never wanted his kids to be afraid of him, but if being scary meant it kept the boys alive then that’s the way it had to be. He wiped a weary hand over his face and wondered when he’d turned into this. His wedding ring was cool on his agitated skin…

  


_If only Mary could see you now._

  


“I’m going to get us a room. Stay in this car and _don’t_ move.” John stressed that last sentence by turning around and looking at his sons. Both of them looked equally pissed off, Sam had adopted Dean’s cross armed position with his coloring book clutched to his chest and pouted at John defiantly. “I mean it Sammy. And I want to see these attitudes gone when I get back.”

He opened the car door and walked towards the reception. 

Dean watched as his father spoke to the pretty lady sat behind a desk who blushed when John said something he couldn’t hear. There was a playful smile on his lips but even from the car his eyes looked dark and distant, as if his mind was somewhere else… Some place Dean didn’t want to know about. 

“I don’t like it here.” Blurted out Sam abruptly, Dean looked to his left and realised his younger brother was clutching his crayons in his fist. A few had broken under the pressure of his hold.

“I heard you the first hundred times. You don’t like anywhere we stay.” Dean replied bitterly, they had this conversation every time they moved.

“Yes I do! I like Uncle Bobby’s and Pastor Jim’s. I don’t like _these_ places..." Sam paused to stare at the pealing paint on the wooden panelled walls of the motel.

" 'specially not here.” He added in an undertone as he opened his book to the page he’d been coloring in for days. It was a family playing together in a pool by their house, smiling dumbly at each other. There was even a dog in the picture, which also came complete with a matching smile. Dean had wanted nothing more than to rip the page out and tear it up ever since he'd laid eyes on it, and today was no exception.

When Dean averted his gaze (trying his hardest not to grab the book) and looked back out towards the reception he found that his father was heading in their direction, key in hand. He approached Sam’s door and unlocked it.

“Come on let’s get our stuff into the room.” He said as he helped Sam out of the car, Dean opened his door and headed to the trunk. 

“Dean just get your own bag and Sam’s okay?” Called John and Dean wondered if that meant their father was going to leave them straight away and not even stay the night. This hunt must be important if it couldn't even wait until tomorrow.

He pulled the two rucksacks out of the trunk and threw them over his shoulder. Dean looked back over at the motel and noticed the tall fir trees that loomed over the shabby buildings, maybe there was some woodland behind them with a river or something that he could take Sam to whilst their dad was hunting. He'd noticed the sun-bleached sign as they drove into this place: _Red River_. He hoped that meant that the town did actually have a river like it's name suggests but that wasn't always the case in the many places the Winchester's had temporally took up residence... In fact last summer they has stayed in a place called Bearsville that, much to Sam's disappointment, was not inhabited by bears. But Dean couldn't exactly ask his father if there was a river or stream near here, he expected him to just shut himself up in a room with an adventurous 5 year old for God knows how long and if he caught a whiff of Dean doing anything other than that there would be hell to pay.

The child was completely lost in his thoughts so when he saw John appear at his side, reaching for a plastic bag at the back that Dean couldn’t reach, he jumped a little and was thankfully jolted out of his brooding. They had unloaded the necessary gear from the trunk so together they marched over to Sam, who was standing in front of Room 34 with a forlorn expression on his face.

“Dad, I don’t wanna stay here.” The young boy complained whilst his eyes darted around the parking lot, spotting a lady in fishnet tights getting out of a man’s car. Her makeup was smeared all over her face and she wiped her mouth in disgust- smudging her lipstick even more. Sam shuddered, the bright red marks around her lips reminded him of a circus clown.

John had to force down his anger that was now dangerously close to overflowing, instead he calmly opened the door to the dank small room and gritted his teeth. “Look it’s only for a couple of days. Stop complaining Sammy, you’ve got plenty of things to do.” He set the plastic bag down on the table and turned his attention to Dean, the volume of his voice changing as his older son placed their bags down beside him. 

“I have to go, the sooner I get this job done the sooner we can leave." John caught Dean's mouth twitch slightly but he remained silent. "There’s enough food here for 3 or 4 days as long as you don’t eat it all in one go..." He glanced down at the pathetic plastic bag, John knew that wasn't exactly brimming with food but they were running low on funds at the moment. He sighed deeply, wishing he could provide more than cans of soup and powdered Mac and Cheese but he knew Dean would cope, he always did. He pushed his deep-seated worry alongside his anger and instead morphed into Dean's Drill Sargent, a role that was so easy to become these days that it was beginning to scare him. 

"What should you do when I leave?” John asked, starting the his usual leaving routine.

“Salt the windows and doors.” Answered Dean, he could recite his father’s questions and the correct answers in his sleep.

“Good. And if I’m not back or you don’t hear from me?”

“Call Pastor Jim.”

“That’s right and you don’t let anybody in the room. I’ve put a shotgun in the closet but that is only for emergencies alright? So what’s the most important thing?”

Dean glanced over to his younger brother who was currently trying to turn on a small TV in front of the double bed. “Watch out for Sammy.”

John looked at Dean earnestly and placed a hand on his shoulder. “I want you to stay here Dean, this town isn’t a nice place. You’ll both be safest in this room okay?”

The boy nodded and John took his hand away. He gave Dean one last sad smile and said goodbye to Sam who barely listened, then walked out of the room. 

  


The sound of the door slamming shut was loud in Dean’s ears, he stared at the closed door for a second before heading over to it and locking it up after his Dad. _Locking me and Sammy in_ , he thought bitterly. The older boy looked inside the bag their father had left them and took out the contents. They had a box of Lucky Charms, one can of spaghetti hoops and another of tomato soup, a carton of milk, and some bread. John had even forgotten to get a box of Mac and Cheese. Or maybe it had just fallen out of the bag... Or even _more_ likely, they just didn't have the money for extra food.

Dean wondered if this was even going to last. Three weeks ago, when John last left them own their own whilst he worked a case, Sam had gotten tired of being hungry due to Dean’s rigid rationing so he sneakily ate their remaining bread during the night as the older boy slept. When Dean woke up the next day he had been so mad that he’d shouted at Sam until his brother had tears streaming down his face. However, Dean had instantly felt guilty at upsetting the younger boy and completely caved. He opened his arms to hold Sam as he sobbed, apologising for being mean but all the time worrying how a packet of macaroni cheese and a near empty box of Cheerios’ were going to see them through two more days...

Dean got to work salting the windows and doors, which didn’t take long at all considering there was only one door and one window in the whole room. Sam watched on quietly, he’d long since stopped asking why they did this strange ritual but he still chirped up from the floor where he was sitting with his book and crayons.

“That’s going to keep us safe right?” He asked in an unsure voice.

“Yeah Sammy it will.” Replied Dean, after placing the salt canister back inside his duffel bag he turned to Sam who had placed his crayons back into their battered up box and was now looking up at Dean expectantly. Dean smirked, he knew Sam must be hungry. His own stomach was starting to hurt too. 

“You want some food?”

Sam’s face lit up, “What have we got?”

“Just the usual.”

And with that answer his brothers face dimmed considerably, Sam groaned and lay on the floor in annoyance. “I hate that stuff. I’m sick of it. Sick, sick **SICK!”** He shook his head on every last word as if it punctuated how bad he felt.

“Well it’s all we have so you’re just going to have to deal with it. Get off the floor Sam you don’t know what’s been on it.”

“I do! People’s feet!” Yelled Sam defiantly.

“Stop being a brat.” Said Dean as he walked over to the little smart-ass and pulled him off the floor, Sam wriggled in his arms and elbowed him in the chest but Dean just dragged him to the table regardless.

“Now pick or I’ll choose.” The older boy ordered as he sat Sam down on the chair.

“You’re no fun. Stop being bossy like Dad!” 

Dean glared at his little brother, _fine if he was going to be like that…_ “We’re having soup.” Dean said, getting up to find the tin opener and knowing full well that Sam was going to argue.

“No we’re not, I want Lucky Charms.” Sam reached across to grab the box and started to open it but Dean snatched it away.

“That’s for breakfast stupid. It’s soup or spaghetti okay? So which one? And if you say Lucky Charms I’ll kill you.”

Sam crossed his arms and smiled... 

  


“Lucky. _Charms._ ”

  


They both stared at each other for a few seconds, then Dean sprang into action. He jumped around the table and Sam screamed as he pushed his chair back and dodged out of Dean’s way. They chased each other around the room, Sam giggling and laughing as he avoided his brother. Dean finally grabbed him and picked him up. He tipped Sam upside-down and shook him as his little brother yelled deliriously. They both fell in a heap on the floor, laughing and out of breath.

  



	2. It Seems I Speak like Waters Leak

* * *

#  ________________

  


  


  


Sam happily ate his Lucky Charms in front of the TV as Dean forced down two slices of buttterless bread at the table, watching his content brother splash milk on the covers of the bed due to the fact that he was completely hypnotised by an episode of Thundercats that they’d both seen a thousand times before. 

Dean chuckled fondly and shrugged off his jacket, the warmth from the busted storage heater (which stubbornly stuck on max no matter how hard Dean tried to turn the dial down) was becoming unbearable. He reached into his pocket to retrieve the room key and whilst doing so he felt something round and thin…

He withdrew his hand to reveal a small silver coin unlike any he’d ever seen before. This one looked ancient and felt heavy, also instead of some president’s profile there was a slightly frightening face etched into the metal with a protruding tongue.

Dean stared at it for a long time, studying it’s every feature. Minutes passed and Dean still clutched the disc protectively in his hand. He couldn’t help but feel like the small coin was important, like he needed it for something and yet he had no clue where it came from. But then his thoughts trailed back to the old man who reached for him in the car, how Dean had completely froze as the withered hands tried to raid his pockets for change… And of the small feeling of a presence that hadn't been there before that he'd felt inside his jacket when the hand had disappeared… But why would he give this coin to Dean when he’d wanted some change for himself?

  


It made no sense. But then again... That flash of silver he'd seen...

  


He sat and flipped the coin over and over again in his hand, wondering why he had it and why after each turn it was becoming so hard for him to let go of it.

  


“What you doing?” Came Sam’s voice from right beside to him. Dean jumped and turned around to see his little brother with his finished bowl of Lucky Charms in his hands staring up at him.

“Nothing.” He said, stuffing the coin into the pocket of his faded jeans. “You finished?”

“Yeah, I ate every bit- not just the marshmallowy bits like you do.”

“Shut up squirt, the marshmallows are the best part.” Replied Dean as he climbed down from the chair and went to turn on the tap.

“But then at the end you’re just left with the boring circle things.” Sam passed the bowl up to Dean for him to clean.

“Correction, _you’re_ left with them Sammy. I’m in charge of food remember?” He gave his brother an evil grin and Sam predicatively started moaning that isn’t _fair_ and that that’s not how things _work_ and that Matthew at his old school said that his mom always got angry at him for stealing the rainbows from the box.

“Well Matthew’s mom's not your mom.” Sighed Dean.

“No, she’s not. We don’t have a mom.” Sam pointed out in that blunt way that little kids have. He stared at Dean for a second, as if he expected an explanation. When Dean didn’t supply him with one the younger boy simply ran off to collect his coloring book and crayons from the floor. 

Dean watched him silently, correcting words were on the tip of his tongue but they caught in his throat and sunk like a rock to his stomach. They did have a mother, one that Sam couldn’t remember. One that had been taken from them. It pained Dean more than he could express that his brother had no memories of their mom. It also terrified him that his own memories of her were slowly fraying, becoming clouded and less clear as time went on. 

  


The older boy busied himself away from these thoughts by washing his brother’s bowl with the lukewarm water that spewed out from the tap with the occasional splutter. The water felt alien on Dean’s skin, somehow it seemed to be pulling his arms down- as if it were a heavy force intent on dragging him into the pooling water at the bottom of the sink. He glared at the running water and then, for a split second, he swore he saw it turn a sickening sludgy black color. Dean turned the tap off quickly, glancing over at Sam to check he hadn’t saw that- the kid already hated the motel room and this town, he didn’t need another thing to complain about. Cautiously he turned the tap back on to double check on the dark liquid he'd seen emit from it just a few moments ago, but this time all he saw was clear and clean water ( _well, as clear and clean as motel water could be_ ) dribbling down into the sink. Dean watched it for a while before Sam’s voice broke his trance.

“Bowl's not that dirty Dean.” The younger boy pointed out, but when Dean turned to look at him Sam had gone back to scribbling on the same page of his coloring book again. The one with the perfect house and the happy family and the smiling dog. This time upon seeing the page sadness rose in Dean instead of anger. The urge to tear it up beyond recognition simply wasn't there anymore. All he could think about now was how Sammy- his goofy little brother- deserved that life and Dean would give anything in the world for him to have it. But their father had explicitly told him that it would never happen, not after their mom's death... 

  


_“Are you kidding me Dean? A **fucking** home?! How could we have another home? With that thing still out there? Something killed your mother and it needs to be found… Needs to pay for what it took from us.” He smelt the whiskey fumes emitting from John as he clutched the front of Dean’s T-shirt desperately, like he was trying to make his 6 year old son realise what had been lost before he pushed him ruffly aside to grab the bottle he was trying to finish before Dean had disturbed him and his grief. _

That had been the last time he'd asked if they were ever going to have a home again. 

  


Sam was once again staring at him with concern filling his young face. Dean simply gave him a warm reassuring smile that never quite reached his eyes then turned off the tap and placed the bowl down to dry. Wearily and reluctantly his little brother returned to his book and resumed coloring in the mother’s hair with his yellow crayon. 

  


Once again Dean returned to the table and sunk down into one of the rigid chairs.

  


He slid his hand back into his pocket and clutched on the coin for comfort and somehow found it, as if the small round disc promised that his mother was waiting for him, not far from here, and that they’d be reunited very soon… His _own_ mother, with her own beautiful yellow hair.

  



	3. And There'll be Coins on my Eyes to Pay

* * * *

#  ________________

  


  


  


The curtains that adorned the windows in the motel room seemed to be thinner than 1 ply toilet paper. Dean sat and watched the occasional shadows pass from a synthetic leather armchair. He’d moved the chair so that it was at the correct angle in front of the bed. From this tactical position he could watch a sleeping Sam and keep an eye on the window and door at the same time. The 9 year old felt like a coiled spring, he jolted upright at any movement he glimpsed or sound he heard from outside the room. 

Something just wasn’t right about this place… _That old man who peered into the car… His father’s warnings about the town... And Sam’s strange insistence that he didn’t want to stay here…_ It all added to Dean’s sense of unease. Without thinking his hand slipped back into his pocket, drawing out the coin once more. He attempted to inspect it more closely in the dim neon glow that leaked into the room.

The coin it's self seemed to belong on the list of strange things that had happened since their arrival in Red River, but for some weird reason Dean didn't think it was strange at all. If anything his ownership of the coin made perfect sense to him. 

His small fingers traced the face with a bulging tongue that had been delicately carved into the silver metal. Their father had always chastised both Sam and Dean for sticking their tongues out at one another but this face didn’t seem to be doing it in a mocking way, it seemed more like… some sort of instruction?

“No way I’m putting that in my mouth.” Dean muttered to himself as he turned over the ancient coin.

  


Right at that very moment Sam decided to suddenly turn in his sleep. The movement startled Dean and caused him to drop the disc. He heard the soft ping of it hitting the floor but unfortunately it was too dark to see where it had landed.

Blind panic flooded Dean’s mind driving out all reason as he raced for the light switch, not even thinking about waking Sam. As the synthetic light flooded the room the younger boy instantly woke up with a start.

“Dean? What’s happ'in?” He said groggily as he rubbed his eyes against the sudden light. Sam peered down to see his brother on all fours searching the floor.

“Where the hell has it gone? _Where is it?_ ” Dean’s hand shot out to feel under the bed and after a few seconds of wildly and desperately sweeping for the coin his hands made contact with cold metal. He grasped it firmly and withdrew his hand. The older boy clutched the small circular object against his chest, his eyes closed tightly at the sheer relief of finding it. When he re-opened his eyes he saw a frightened looking Sam kneeling down in front of him.

“What is that?” He asked, his small hand outstretching.

Without thinking Dean slapped his arm away, but when he saw the look on Sam’s face he instantly regretted doing it. It was his job to protect Sammy and here he was scrambling after a coin in the middle of the night when he was _supposed to be on watch?_ If his father were here he would be in so much trouble…

Dean took a deep breath to try and calm his shot nerves. After regaining some composure he put the coin (which was harder to let go of than it should have been) back into his pocket and pulled Sam to his feet.

“Nothing you need to worry about. Come on, back to bed.” 

“But you woke me up!" Sam tried to pull away from Dean, his shaggy hair falling over his face as he struggled. "You turned on the light! What you looking for Dean? You’re scaring me.”

“I’m sorry Sammy just go to sleep.” Pleaded Dean, he needed his brother to let this go. It had to be way past midnight and Dean could feel the comforting draw of the coin from inside his pocket niggling away at him.

“No!” Sam finally pulled out of Dean’s grip and turned to face him, “Tell me now!”

“IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU IT’S _MINE!_ ” The words thundered out of his mouth before he could stop them. The voice that had escaped from him had sounded far stronger and louder than that of a 9 year-old child. Sam gazed up at him with a terrified expression on his face, his mouth agape in shock, he looked seconds away from running away from him. 

Dean opened his mouth to apologize again but before he could utter a single word the ceiling light suddenly **exploded**.

  


They were plunged into darkness as small shards of glass rained down on them from the blown light bulb. 

  


On instinct Dean’s hands shot out for his brother but instead he found himself grasping at thin air. 

“Sammy?” Dean called desperately, the terror he’d felt previously at losing the coin was nothing compared with how he was feeling now. He spun around quickly, trying to spot a Sam-like shape anywhere in the room. As his eyes adjusted to the dark once more he spotted a small foot sticking out from under the bed.

The older boy knelt down to look underneath and Sam scurried away from him, Dean’s chest burned at the sight of his little brother cowering under the bed because of him. _No_ , because he was _scared_ of him. However Dean sucked it up, he figured that maybe this was the best place for Sam right now- the safest place. 

  


Because Dean hadn’t blown that light bulb. 

  


And Dean certainly hadn’t made the room suddenly turn 10 degrees colder.

  


“Listen Sammy.” Dean whispered to the frightened shape under the bed, he saw his breath in front of him as he spoke. “Sorry for shouting but that wasn’t me who blew the light... No matter what- you stay under here, don’t make a sound okay?” He could see two hazel eyes glowing in the dim blue florescent glow from the parking lot, but they weren’t focused on Dean… They were staring straight at the window…

Dean followed their gaze and shuddered in fear as he saw a large slow moving shadow right outside their window, slowly a hand outstretched as it made it’s way to their door...

“D-Dean..” Breathed Sam as the door handle began to shake.

“It’s okay Sammy.” Reassured Dean as he quietly moved towards the closet, eyes never leaving the rattling handle as he reached a shaking hand out to clasp it around the barrel of the shotgun that their father had left them.

“You just stay quiet, we'll be fine- I promise.” Dean whispered as he moved silently to stand in front of the bed, shielding his brother, and aimed the shotgun at the door.

  


The handle suddenly clicked and moved downwards with a spine-chilling creak.

  


  


Dean Winchester’s shaking finger pulled the shotgun's trigger to greet whatever was on the other side of the door as it swung open.

  



	4. The Flood will Swallow all you Leave Behind

* * * * * *

#  ________________

  


  


  


Silence and darkness greeted him as soon as the buckshot shell left the barrel of the gun.

  


In the still atmosphere the smell of gunpowder filled Dean’s nostrils. He hadn’t expected the recoil from the shotgun to be so powerful and was pretty sure that the left side of his chest would be covered with some impressive looking deep purple bruises in a few days’ time... That is, **if** he got out of this alive. 

Slowly Dean started to realize that the reason he couldn’t see a thing was because he had closed his eyes so tightly that to an onlooker it would appear that his eyelids were welded shut.

But that didn’t alarm him in the slightest. He really didn’t want to open them. He didn’t want to see- at least not quite yet.

The boy relied on his other senses for a moment and he noted the eerie silence once more. In fact, thinking about it, Dean hadn’t even heard a body drop to the floor in response to his firing of the gun. Did he miss the target? Or had there been nothing there to hit in the first place?

Dean took a deep breath to steady himself and gripped the shotgun tighter. He pried his eyes open to reveal…

 

Nothing.

 

There was no one in the doorway.

 

No body on the floor.

 

Just an empty room and an open door.

 

The child let a small relieved laugh escape him. _It had just been Sam,_ he started to rationalize to himself, _his little brother had been making him imagine things- playing a trick on him._ He’d been so worked up about losing that damn coin ( _which was still in his pocket right? mustn’t lose it, **CAN’T** lose it again..._ ) that Sam’s little terrified display had caught him off guard. Yes, that was it- the lock was probably broken and had simply sprung open on its own, broken like everything else in this town. There was no hand, never was… probably just some stranger walking past their window on the way to their own room…

Just as he started to lower his gun, believing this whole episode to be over, he heard a deep voice come from behind him.

  


His blood ran cold.

  


“Hello Dean.” It said. 

  


The creature that the voice belonged to had to be on the other side of the bed. Right above a petrified hiding Sam. All the fear that Dean felt in this moment had to be pushed aside, protectiveness and the urge to fight replaced it. Because that thing, whatever it may be, was close to his little brother.

Dean spun around to face the intruder, the shotgun held tightly in his grip...

  


The bright green eyes were met with the sight of a figure twice his size. It wore a long black coat which appeared to been in a very bad state of disrepair… Stray fibers and strings protruded out of the various holes that littered the jacket. Calloused and withered hands poked out of its damp sleeves. Dean swallowed hard, he recognized those hands. He dared himself to look into the owner’s face and there he saw the old man who had reached into the Impala’s window, searching for change, not eight hours ago.

The man’s mouth split into that yellow toothed smile once more, his weather-worn skin wrinkling even more as he grinned down at Dean. Gradually the stench of rot, dirt, and sea water replaced the lingering smell of gun powder. 

Dean Winchester tried to open his mouth to speak but no words came.

“It's _so_ nice to see you again.” Boomed the old man’s voice. It seemed to reverberate around the room- invading the space with ease.

“W-w-who-” Dean’s stuttering speech came out in an unconvincing croak. He cleared his throat to speak again, this time he tried to inject some authority into the 9-year-old voice by imitating his father’s stern tone, “Who are you, what are you doing here?” He demanded loudly, attempting to match the same volume as the man’s voice and failing miserably. 

The intruder’s grin widened even more as his entire face crumpled into a harsh loud laugh. He slapped an arm up to his chest as he chortled. In response to the collision of hand on torso the door to their room slammed shut, so hard the walls shook.

“Someone will hear!” Yelled Dean over the laughter, “The other room’s will hear and call the police!” He knew how childish he sounded but he just couldn’t hide the fear that lingered in his thinly veiled threats that, even to his own ears, sounded like pleas. His younger brother lay beneath the double bed listening to the ringing laughter, trying not to make a sound just like Dean had told him earlier. But all the while Sam’s eyes darted around frantically for a weapon, for anything that could help them…

“Don’t worry, they won’t.” Chuckled the old man, his laughter dying out, “They’re sound asleep, dead to the world. I can have that effect on people- if I want to.”

“Who-“ Began Dean again but the creature cut across him.

“Oh of course! _Who am I?_ ” The invader pondered theatrically as he stared into the mirror opposite him, Dean followed the man’s gaze and what he saw in the reflection made his stomach turn violently.

  


His true form was visible in the dirty glass of the wall mounted mirror and the child saw the drooping pale green skin that hung from his real face. The flesh was rotting and water logged, barnacles and limpets clung to his clothing and his skin in equal measure. The left side of his face was devoid of skin altogether, there was only the gray dull sheen of his exposed skull. Dean tore himself away from the nightmare inducing sight and was actually relieved to see that the monster still wore it’s relatively human looking form when he returned his eyes back to the old man. 

“I’m ancient Dean… So. _Very._ Old.” He whispered across to the boy, “You wouldn’t even believe. Sometimes I think I may be a sailor, other times a transporter- a deliverer of sorts…” He mused out loud, as if he was trying to explain his identity to himself as well as Dean.

“You see I’ve sailed these rivers for eons with the same precious cargo… I’ve taken so many souls on their last journey, the most important journey.” He bared his rotting teeth to him once more, Dean realized what a poor excuse for a smile it was. “They gave me the name Charon, if you really need to put a name to this face.”

The name sounded familiar to Dean, he tried to place it- tried to rack his brains for it but found nothing. His father would know. John Winchester would know it’s origin, the creature’s M.O and most importantly, how to kill the thing. But Dean, his eldest son, a hunter in the making… couldn’t even keep the thing out of their motel room- even when he had a clean shot.

 

Under the bed Sam was trembling in fear, still searching for something to help Dean. He’d all but given up when out of the corner of his eye he spotted a glint of silver, something that usually lay beneath his brother’s pillow…

Dean’s hunting knife.

 

“I think you know why I’m here.” Charon spoke again, Dean's small jump at the deafening sound of the creatures voice covered the sound of Sam's. The older boy watched as the old man's one visible eye seemed to fill with fire as he stared straight at Dean’s pocket.

The smell of burning fabric reached Dean's nose before he felt sudden white hot searing heat blistering his right thigh. He gasped in pain and looked down to see a small circular red glow visible through the pocket of his worn-out jeans.

“The coin.” Dean breathed.

“That’s right.” Nodded Charon, he waved his hand nonchalantly and the burning feeling ebbed away.

“You can have it!” Yelled Dean, stuffing his hand frantically into his jean’s pocket- which was singed and blackened. His hand grasped the coin and he held it out in front of him. “Just take it back and go!”

“Fine. Throw it over.” Charon calmly looked Dean square in the face, daring him to do it.

The young boy looked down at the coin in his outstretched palm longingly. His whole entire body was screaming at him to throw it, to get rid of the damn thing. _What was it to him?_ But he simply couldn’t do it. He didn’t know why but its hold on him was too strong.

Dean flinched as Charon’s laughter filled the room again.

“You can’t can you! Of _course_ you can’t Dean! Why do you think I gave it to you in the first place? It belongs to you, it’s _tethered_ to you. You need it.”

“Why? What do I need it for?” The hand holding the coin was trembling now.

“It’s your fare.” Smiled Charon. Filthy water was now dripping from the sleeves of his coat, flowing onto the floor where Sam was lying silently under the bed, staring at the pair of feet clad in rotted boots, caked in mud and sand. He listened to the stranger speaking to his brother with a hand clasped over his mouth to stifle a scream that was threatening to escape him at any moment. His other hand slowly reached out to grasp the hilt of the fallen knife…

“My fare? My fare for what?” Dean croaked, afraid to hear the answer.

 

Charon stepped forward, his eyes alight with glee.

  


“For your journey Dean..."

 

"Payment for your soul’s safe voyage to the underworld...”

  



	5. Armor Down on the Wettest Ground

* * * * * *

#  ________________

  


  


John Winchester stared blankly at the cream leather dash of the 67’ Chevrolet Impala, his eyes heavy with the exhaustion of looking through file after file of missing persons reports down at the police station. He wiped a hand affectionately over the glovebox, this car had served him well despite its obvious draw backs… She guzzled through gas like no tomorrow, eating up money that John simply didn’t have. She hated snow with a fiery passion, groaning and swerving and just being damn near uncontrollable in icy terrain. And compared with these new modern cars John was willing to bet that the Impala’s safety rating wasn’t exactly up to scratch… He had considered selling the car after Mary’s death, after all it was just another reminder of how he’d let his wife down- John had been sent out to buy a VW camper van and he’d come back home with an already 6-year-old $2204 muscle car. 

_“If I sent you to by a carton of milk you’d end up coming back with a packet of magic beans.” Mary said after the initial shock of seeing the shining black vehicle instead of the van he'd promised her wore off. She looked at John with a bemused but fond smile shining on her radiant face._

The car hadn’t made much sense at the time, always seemed a little out of place in the driveway of their blue suburban house straight out of _Better Homes and Gardens_. But after the events of the 2nd of November, 1983, when normality had shattered into a thousand unrepairable pieces the Impala became their sanctuary- their new 4th family member. Suddenly that huge trunk, that had previously housed groceries, camping trip supplies and Dean’s small bike, became the perfect place for an arsenal. The bulky bench-like leather seats in the front which had been something of an inconvenience in the past became essential during those first few months when he couldn’t let the boys out of his sight or reach, needing them to be within an arm’s length of him at all times. She belonged on those dirt roads John had banished his shrunken family to endlessly ride down, the beaten rural tracks, the sleazy motels and Americana diners. It was as if he’d bought the car specifically for these times without knowing. The car was for hunting, for his sons, for their life without Mary…

He glanced in the rear-view mirror out of habit and looked at the cold empty seats in the back. His two sons weren’t with him. John had left them alone in a shithole of a motel room to carry out urgent business. 

Saving lives… Hunting monsters… You know, _the usual._

But looking through all those missing person files and having each photograph of the lost stare up at him accusingly had got him feeling some kind of way. Some kind of morose, hopeless way.

So he looked up at the flashing neon light of the small bar that beckoned him as he placed his hand on the chrome door handle and hoped that his son’s didn’t need him as much as he needed a drink right now.

 

#  _________________________________________

  


 

The motel room had fallen silent again, the only sound came from the small rhythmic dripping of water that was leaking from Charon’s coat.

Dean stood, his arm still outstretched, staring at the small coin in his hand as the old man’s revelation washed over him. In his mind's eye he could see his mother waiting for him at the end of a stalagmite encrusted cave, a pure white light surrounding her. The image was so clear and tempting, but it faded away as quick as it had came and Dean fell back into the reality of the eerie dark room where a strange old ferryman stood across from him- promising bliss.

“I can take you there Dean. You don’t necessarily have to be willing but it helps.” Charon said after a while, he used a more persuasive tone than he’d used previously. It was laced with assurance and sincerity. “I help people find peace, that’s what you want right? I can feel it, the bone deep exhaustion you feel- a part of you that’s missing... That’s what drew me to you in the first place… your longing for the beyond.”

Charon’s words soothed him, made him think of calm waters and soft yellow hair. But as Dean cast his eyes down towards the floor he caught a glimpse of Sam’s small bare foot from underneath the bed. The sight of it brought him to his senses…

 

_“So what’s the most important thing?”_

_“Watch out for Sammy.”_

 

The old man looked down too, he shook his head slightly and chuckled, as if he knew what the young boy was thinking.

“Dean, I can take you to your mother. She’s waiting for you.” He announced, almost like a counter offer. The old man raised his arms, which trickled with water, and the temperature in the room dropped even lower, causing Dean’s quickened breath to appear in front of him.

Faintly he saw the outline of someone familiar appear at Charon’s shoulder. The figure was transparent and wispy, barely even there, but Dean knew who it was. He could recognise her anywhere.

 _“Dean…”_ She whispered in that soft loving voice, filling his heart with warmth. _“Dean come see me…”_

Then as soon as she appeared she was gone, taking the warmth with her.

“Mom?” Dean called out in vain despite knowing she had left.

“Come with me and you can be with her forever.” Smiled Charon serenely.

“NO!” Screamed a voice from below them both, taking them by surprise. A streak of brown hair and silver metal rushed out from under the bed and launched itself at the old man.

“Sammy!” Cried Dean, tearing across the double bed to reach for him.

“YOU CAN’T HAVE HIM, I WON’T LET YOU!” Sam roared, attempting to plunge Dean’s silver knife into Charon. However, the 5-year-old’s full height only reached just above the stranger's left knee.

Despite the height difference Sam raised his hand high and brought it down fast. The knife sunk into the man’s leg with a sickening squelch. They all froze, staring down at the visible hilt.

Sam looked back at Dean with a look of triumph on his face. The older boy, who had propelled himself onto the bed towards Sam and was now lying across it on his stomach- arms out to grab his brother, knew that Sam had not slayed the dragon like he thought he had. 

Charon’s wizened hand slowly reached down and withdrew the blade with ease. The hole that was left behind wept a deep green ooze. Sam’s eyes widened as he watched the creature drop the silver knife onto the floor with a loud clang. Dean however took the opportunity to grab his brother’s arm and drag them both back over to the other side of the bed, away from Charon’s reach.

“It’s not up to you, child.” Said Charon dangerously, no hint of a smile on his weather-worn face. 

“Leave us alone, you can't have Dean!” Sam screamed from behind the older boy, he tried desperately to get past Dean and managed to duck past his arms and run out in front of him but Dean caught him and wrapped his stronger arms around Sam’s middle. 

“You’re not taking him!” The younger boy spat at Charon as he tried to struggle out of his brother's hold.

“Sammy calm down!” Pleaded Dean, this was all unravelling… He clutched at Sam’s pyjamas, trying to pull his brother behind him again to shield him. Charon was advancing slowly on them now. Sam had clearly pissed him off.

“I wouldn’t get in my way Sam.” It growled as it outstretched a single hand towards the younger boy. The old man’s skin was starting to droop and turn that repulsive shade of green…

In a last ditch attempt to protect his little brother Dean picked Sam up of the ground and spun him around and away from Charon, aiming to push Sam into the small bathroom behind them. However, in the blink of an eye the creature disappeared as Dean turned away and then reappeared right in front of them in the bathroom's doorway.

One pale green finger touched Sam’s forehead and his hazel eyes fluttered shut. The boy fell limp in his brother’s arms.

“Sam! Oh God Sammy!” Shouted Dean, falling to the floor with his brother. “Sam…” He whispered as he shook the small boy desperately for a response.

“Don’t worry.” Came Charon’s voice from above him, Dean payed him no mind as he carried on shaking his brother and begging him to wake whilst the man looked down at him with a impatient expression on his withered face, “He’s merely sleeping.”

Dean placed a trembling hand above Sam’s mouth and nearly collapsed in relief when he felt the warmth of Sam’s slow and steady breath.

“You son of a bitch.” Seethed Dean as he glared up at the man.

“No one interferes with my cargo or delays our voyage Dean.” Said Charon plainly. “Now I told you didn’t I? You don’t have to be willing.”

The young boy pushed a few strands of his brother’s chestnut hair out of his sleeping face, “You said it helps.” He muttered.

“That’s right. Sam’s sleeping at the moment and he will wake up, that is… _If_ you take your journey down the river.” The old man stated, there was no malice in his voice just a steely promise of calm waters.

“I- I can’t… I can’t just leave him here.” Whispered Dean. 

Not here in this motel room. Not here on this earth.

Charon sighed heavily. “If that’s the way you’re going to play it…” 

Something was glowing in the middle of the bedsheets. Dean looked up to see a small circle of red leave the bed and hover above it. He knew what it was and how it had got there... The object had fallen out of his hand as he reached for his brother a while back and had been driven out of his mind for a while by Sam’s unexpected attack on Charon.

 

It was his coin. 

_No._

**The** Coin.

 

The disc started to slowly spin and Dean felt an aching longing for it.

“No. Not again… I don’t need it!” The boy shook his head violently, trying to shake the compulsion to leave Sam and grab the thing back.

Fog started to seep up through the floor, which he only just realised was damp with stagnant water.

 _“It’s okay my angel.”_ Came a familiar soft female voice.

Dean looked up at Charon and saw the faint figure of his mother once more standing beside him. Fog started to twist around her, making her more solid and more tangible than before. The old man now held a driftwood staff and he angled it towards the bed at the spinning disc, which had returned to it’s dull silver sheen.

The coin moved towards Dean…

_“It belongs to you son.”_

He couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe in the thickening fog.

_“It will take you to me.”_

The fog swirled around Sam's slumbering form and up towards Dean, wrapping around them like chains. The vapours encircled Dean’s arms and clung to them with an uncomfortable tightness, they made him let go of the vice-like grip he had on his brother and took control of his right hand in order to force his hand to reach out and grasp the coin tightly.

Suddenly a great calmness washed over him from his head to his toes, along with acceptance and a dull sense of fatigue, he now welcomed the hold of the ghostly fog which had stopped feeling like heavy chains and turned into a welcome comforting support that held him in a loving embrace. He was so tired of fighting, of this thankless life. Since the age of 4 all the light had all been drained from him and replaced with crushing responsibility. He couldn't bare it. He needed peace... some respite. Charon had promised him rest hadn't he? All they had to do was set sail. 

His fate was sealed.

Now there were only clear waters ahead.

 

“It is time.” Charon’s voice cut through the white mist.

 

“The river awaits…”

 


	6. I Move in Water, Shore to Shore

* * * * * *

#  ________________

  


  


The green carpet was waterlogged. 

A body lay upon it, sleeping.

It twitched and stirred, small hands clawed at the damp material for leverage and the child pushed himself onto his knees.

His head felt muddled and heavy. Multiple questions ran through his disorientated brain. _Why was he on the floor? Had he fallen off the bed? Why was the carpet all wet? Had Dean left the bath running?_

For some reason, at the thought of his brother, an emptiness seemed to spread throughout Sam’s body.

“Dean?” The boy called out uncertainly as he peeled his uncooperating eyelids open.

Sam Winchester pulled himself up with the help of a dilapidated bedside table, if he hadn’t been a small child of 5 years he was pretty sure the thing would have crumpled under his weight.

He was unsteady on his feet but he fought through the overwhelming feeling of fatigue that flowed through his small frame.

Something was wrong, something had happened- he knew it, but his brain was taking a long time to catch up.

“Dean? Where are you?” Sam asked the empty room but he got no reply. He shivered in fear, and when he continued to tremble he realised he was also shivering with cold.

He turned around to see the door to the room open a crack. Sam walked tentatively towards it, as he drew closer he noticed green slime that looked vaguely familiar coating the door handle .

  


_The hole that was left behind wept a deep green ooze._

  


_**Deep Green blood…** _

  


A switch flipped in his head. Pictures suddenly flooded Sam’s mind in rapid succession.

_HIS BROTHER’S MOMENTARILY INHUMAN FACE SHOUTING AT HIM WHEN HE REACHED OUT FOR A SMALL COIN… AN EXPLODING CEILING LIGHT, A FIGURE AT THE WINDOW, THE FREEZING COLD, DIVING UNDER THE BED, A GUNSHOT, TWO LARGE BROWN SHOES, A FLASH OF SILVER..._

_“Dean, I can take you to your mother. She’s waiting for you.”_

_**“Come with me** and you’ll be with her forever.”_

  


“No.” Whispered Sam. 

That man… That old tramp who had appeared at the Impala’s window…. He had come back for Dean.

Sam snaked his small hand around the ajar door and pulled it open, avoiding touching the emerald sludge on the handle, to reveal the motel parking lot.

The ethereal glow of the hotel’s neon sign gave the entire space a strange blue tinge. There was not a soul in sight, the only inhabitants were four sporadically parked cars. And they were empty.

Wild panic started to consume the small boy as his eyes darted around, looking for any sign of his older brother. 

“DEAN?!” He yelled into the deserted lot, only hearing an echo of his own frightened voice in return. 

Sam hung his head in defeat, completely at a loss of what to do. He didn’t want to be alone in this ultramarine colored nightmare, he wanted Dean back. 

Just as he was about to retreat back into the motel room he spotted two sets of foot prints on the concrete path that ran from room to room. One was large and indistinguishable, but the other smaller pair were definitely his brothers- the left footprint had a large crack in it which Sam was sure it was where the sole of Dean’s sneakers had split just a couple of weeks ago.

The footprints reminded him of the breadcrumb trail that Hansel and Gretel had left behind in the forest so that they could find their way home. Dean had read that book to him when their father had taken them to Pastor Jim’s last summer, and Sam had suffered from nightmares for weeks thanks to the graphic illustrations of the witch being burnt alive in her own stove. His brother had cradled him and lulled him back to sleep every time he woke up in a terrified sweat, murmuring softly that no witch would get him whilst he was around.

But Dean wasn’t around now. And Sam wasn’t brave enough to follow the trail by himself. Sam was frightened and alone, he’d been the former many times before but he had never been the latter. 

What he really needed was help. Maybe help in the form of their father.

  


Sam ran back into the deserted room and searched through Dean’s duffle bag, looking for his brother’s old battered up exercise book which had all the important phone numbers in it. After he’d moved aside the dirty clothes and various drawings that Sam had given to Dean (including a macaroni owl drawing that couldn’t have looked less like an owl) he found the book at the very bottom of the bag. He pulled it out so vigorously that he tore the front cover clean off. 

“Sorry Dean.” He murmured in vain to his absent brother as he turned to the back to discover five long numbers written in Dean’s scrawl. His stomach plummeted as he noticed that none of them had names written next to them. 

Tears started to well up in Sam’s eyes. Why couldn’t they just write the names down? _Why did they have to have so many secrets?_ Sam just didn’t understand and he felt like he never would. His brother and father’s secrets must have begun when their Mom had gone away.

He tried to rack his brains as Sam was sure Dean had shown the numbers to him once before and told him which one was which but he couldn’t for the life of him remember. Sam wasn’t even sure if any of the numbers were correct anymore, considering how much his family and anyone they knew moved around. The young boy roughly wiped away his tears as his brother’s words echoed in his head, _“Well it’s all we have so you’ll just have to deal with it.”._

The numbers were all Sam had and though they might be nameless and long, he had to try.

He climbed up onto the double bed, picked up the motel phone and began to type in the first number. It was slow work as the 5-year-old tried not to mix any of the digits up whilst he scrunched up his face in concentration…

  


One number rang out.

  


One number answered on the last ring, however the stranger on the other side just cursed loudly at Sam for waking him and flung the phone down abruptly.

  


Another answered with a voice Sam recognised, but it wasn’t his father. He hung up after the surly voice at the end of the line asked _“Who is this?”._

  


And the last one didn’t even ring, the number had been disconnected.

  


Sam slammed the receiver down, threw his head into the pillow next to him and screamed in a mixture of anger, annoyance and grief. Dean was out there, wherever that monster had taken him and he didn’t know what to do.

His brother would have known, the boy thought sadly, if it was Sam out there Dean would have followed those footsteps without a second thought. The small child sniffed and shifted on the bed, his hand landing on the torn cover of Dean’s exercise book. He looked down, peering closer at the page, and saw two little crudely drawn figures in the bottom corner, one taller with spikes coming out of its head and one smaller but with longer darker hair.

A sense of purpose ran through Sam... If he was the only one left, he was going to be brave. The young boy bent down and picked up his shoes, which were damp and uncomfortable from being on the puddle-laden floor. He did an awful job of lacing them up as Dean normally did them for him but Sam stuffed the wet untidy ends into his shoes so he wouldn’t trip. Lastly he shrugged his jacket on and drew himself up to his full height (which wasn’t very tall at all) to try to make himself feel more courageous. 

Sam gave the dark empty room one last look and took a deep steadying breath. His trembling hands reached for the door but suddenly froze as a loud ringing filled his ears.

  


The phone.

  


The boy ran towards the sun-yellowed motel phone like his life depended on it, lifting the receiver up so quickly he nearly knocked himself out with it as he pressed it against his ear.

A slightly slurred but unmistakable voice emitted through the speaker.

“Dean? S’that you?” 

Sam almost collapsed in relief.

  


“Dad it’s Sammy.” He panted desperately into the phone, “We need help.”

 

  


  


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

  


  


 

It was 3:00am.

  


The black sky was cloudless, allowing the moon to be seen in clear view. 

  


And below it Dean Winchester was lying on the riverside, staring up at the dark void above him. 

“A wanning moon.” He whispered absently as a skeletal hand gripped his ankle and slowly started to drag him into the murky water.

  


As the boy was being moved his green eyes kept their unsteady gaze on the stars and he wondered whether he would be up there with them soon, whether there was anyone or anything that was looking down at him at this moment whilst he was being pulled to his watery grave. Dean's memory of even arriving at this point was hazy, he had a vague notion of walking side by side with an older man into the woods behind the motel whilst his feet had seemed to move on their own accord. However, by the time they'd reached the riverside his legs had collapsed underneath him- but that didn't matter. They had reached their destination.

Above him he could just about glimpse the top of the old man's head and a knotted bit of driftwood that he held like a staff. The smooth piece of wood emitted an emerald green light as the man, who was neither a man or a creature- but a God, spoke to it in a foreign language. Dean thought lazily to himself that it was as if Charon was summoning something... Something _vital._

The coin was coiled tightly in his hand, pulsating a numbing warmth through his body. Nothing else really mattered but holding on to the coin. Other desperate thoughts tried to claw their way to the front of his mind, ones that bore the face of his brother... ones that feared the deep river that he was slowly being submerged in... But the thoughts stayed beneath the surface of his hazy mind, his body didn't flinch or even make an effort to escape. Dean barely even felt the cool water seeping through his clothes, drenching him to the bone.

Charon toed the boy further down the river wordlessly, wading through the deep water with ease- as if it were only thin air. Dean also floated weightlessly on the inky surface of the river with no difficulty, the green glow that still emanated from the driftwood staff now surrounded him too. 

Eventually, after what felt like both an eternity and a split second, they stopped moving. Dean realised that they had reached the widest and deepest point of the river, but the panic that started to rise in his head couldn't make it out of the dull suffocating fog which had inhabited his mind.

 _Let it be over,_ came his last coherent thought through the fog that had entered his brain, _let me rest._

But somewhere deeper in his thoughts another a small voice battled it's way up, one that begged to be heard. It spoke one word, over and over again. 

_Sammy._

The old man, who was unaware and uncaring of the inner war that was raging in the head of the young boy below him, simply lowered him further down as the water lapped greedily around his face…

All he could hear was his mother’s voice calling from afar, promising peace and care, whilst Charon started to chant feverishly to the river itself, causing the calm surface to ripple and swirl.

  


**"You only dared give your life,"** Bellowed Charon as the green light ebbed away and he raised his staff, **"For the life of your lord in Hades."**

The boy stared up into the deeply lined face of the old man and he looked back at him. 

 

Charon placed a withered finger on Dean's forehead and bared his yellow rotting teeth in a leering triumphant grin, **"Light rest the earth above you."**

  


The light and his weightlessness disappeared. Dean began to sink into the dark depths of the river like a stone.

  


  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The last words that Charon speaks (in bold) are from a play called **Alcestis** By Euripides, an ancient Greek tragedy that has inspired this work a lot!


	7. Down to the Shoreline, the End of a Bloodline

* * * * * *

#  ________________

  


  


“You okay there Sugar?” The gritty female voice that came from across the wooden bar sounded like it had puffed three dozen packs of smokes in the last hour alone.

John just nodded and kept his troubled gaze on the tarnished gold of the beer taps in front of him. The words that he wanted to sarcastically growl back at her stuck in his throat…

  


_Can you top me up Sugar?_

_Darling?_

_**My Angel?** _

_Be a doll and give me some more booze would ya?_

_**Can you promise it’ll numb the pain?** _

  


But instead of making a scene that his three-neat-whiskeys-in-a-row addled self desperately wanted him to create, the hunter just silently tapped the top of his glass with his index finger to indicate that he wanted another drink.

The alcohol didn’t numb the pain at all. Nothing could, not the thrill of hunting, not cutting down monsters, burning restless spirits, not even saving people... There was just a gaping chasm in his soul that kept getting larger with each passing month. John had hoped that finally catching and brutally killing his wife’s murderer would heal him but these days, five years on from that night, it was looking less and less likely that he would ever get revenge and close that void. The only thing that consuming copious amounts of alcohol did was blur his reality just enough, just that little extra bit to the point where he could almost convince himself that Mary was still alive and back in Lawrence waiting for him with their boys (who were safe and sound and tucked up in their own beds) and that he wasn’t leaning on a filthy roadhouse bar with a 50-year-old barmaid who possessed a voice so full of gravel it could pave a driveway ogling him from across it.... That he hadn’t just abandoned Mary’s sons in a sleazy motel for the sake of some hunt which he was currently avoiding so that he could hang off a bar stool and attempt to drink himself into oblivion.

  


In fact, when he came to think about it, he wasn’t even hanging off the threadbare bar stool anymore. John found himself out in the cool night air staring right at his car on shaky legs with keys in his hand and the burn of whiskey still present at the back of his throat.

  


John crawled into the driver’s side of the Impala, using its large steering wheel to pull himself in. After slamming the door shut with way more force than he had meant to, John let his heavy head fall backwards and stared up at the roof of the car whilst he tried to remember why he had ever pulled into this dive in the first place. The hunter blinked hard as if trying to rid himself of the slightly blurred vision that whiskey had granted him and found a little personal victory in the fact that it only took him two attempts to put the key in the ignition.

Just as John was about to pull out of the dirty field that was masquerading as a parking lot a faint muffled ringing reached his ears. Glancing out of the window out into the deserted area surrounding him gave him no answer as to where the sound was coming from.

The ringing stopped just as John realised it was actually coming from behind him.

He turned his body around to search the back seats but all he saw were the missing person’s case files he had snagged from the police station; he'd only taken the three most recent victims with him, kindly leaving the rest behind for the perplexed cops. The missing’s monochrome faces stared directly at him once again, all with the same silent accusation in their dreary eyes. A small description of their sad lives accompanied the dull photographs and every single one of the victims had one thing in common, they had all suffered in some capacity- _child abuse, loss of a loved one, drug addiction, history of depression…_ he couldn’t help thinking that whatever had got them may have been simply putting them out of their misery. The fresh-faced deputy at the station had pretty much told him that they suspected that the disappearances were all suicides; they just didn’t have the bodies to prove it. In all honesty John would have agreed with them, if it wasn’t for the pattern of the disappearances, the fact that they had all gone missing in the dead of night and that there had been puddles of water left behind in their houses…

John shook himself out of his dazed thoughts about the disappearances and let his mind focus on the source of the now quiet ringing. For some reason a pit had started to develop in his stomach as the hunter realised it must had emitted from his personal phone, which had been tossed into his bag and then subsequently thrown into the trunk when he decided he needed a little nightcap. Only 3 people knew the number for that phone, one of them was John’s nine-year-old son who could recite it on cue and frequently did so.

John flung open the car door once more and ran to the trunk, irrational thoughts clouding his normally steady but currently whiskey influenced mind. Somehow he became convinced it had been Dean calling him, his mind helpfully flooded his vision with images of his children fighting off monsters alone and being torn apart by sharp claws whilst he had been sat nursing a drink like the Grade A father that John was. He hadn't even been working the case he'd left them for- not for 3 hours at least. He flung the trunk open in a blind panic and practically spilled the contents of his duffel bag out onto the damp ground to retrieve the phone that he had sworn he’d heard ringing only moments ago. 

The gray brick-like cell phone finally fell from the well-worn bag and John snatched it up to glare at its small screen.

  


1 missed call.

  


John Winchester swore to God if this had just been Bobby Singer drunk dialling him he’d swing for someone.

He redialled the number and held it close to his ear, again the image of his eldest son briefly fluttered into his head along with that unexplainable sense of dread.

The ringing stopped. Someone on the other side had answered. 

  


“Dean? S’that you?” Asked John before he could stop himself.

 _“Dad it’s Sammy. We need help.”_ Came a small out-of-breath voice from the other side. One that sounded completely terrified.

“Sammy?" _Not Dean, why the hell was Sam calling him? This was bad, so **very** bad, _ "What’s wrong? What’s happened?” Questioned John, fear starting to course through his veins- it replaced the alcohol in his system and sobered him up in a matter of seconds.

 _“Dean’s g-gone. The man took him.”_ Sam was trying to stifle his sobs- it completely broke John to hear the hitch in his son's voice so he gripped the edge of the car tightly in an effort to keep himself calm.

“What man?”

 _“The- The scary man at the car! He was in our room, talking about mom, saying that Dean wanted to come with him, and I… He did…”_ Sam let out a muffled but frustrated cry, _“I woke up and they were gone.”_

“The old tramp looking for change?” John was already back in the car and gunning the engine, his mind firmly fixed on making it back to Red River.

_“Yes him! He came back for Dean and there’s footprints outside the room, I was gunna follow-“_

“No!” The hunter nearly swerved off the road, he couldn’t cope with both of his boys missing- he didn’t even want to think about what that would do to him, “You stay where you are Sammy, you hear me? Don’t go out alone, just wait for me. Check the salt lines aren’t broken, can you do that for me son?”

There was movement from the other end and John hoped that Sam was checking on the salt lines like he’d asked.

 _“There’s still salt on the windows but the line at the door's not there. I think the water took it.”_ Came Sam’s worried voice.

“Water? What water?”

 _“There’s water on the floor, the man did it- he was full of water like a tap.”_ As John tried to make sense of his son's nonsense Sam sniffed and moved the phone- causing a muffled noise that, for a second, made him think the signal was breaking up. 

The hunter gripped the large cell phone even tighter, he was pretty sure he was going to crush the phone in two when a small piece of bone-chilling information he’d read earlier drifted into the forefront of his mind…

_**All gone missing in the dead of night… With puddles of water left behind in their houses…** _

Whatever had taken Dean, had also took those people too. Them lonely, sad, people who had almost seemed to be begging for death.

His son wasn’t- _couldn’t-_ be one of the missing. There was still time and a shred of hope burning rebelliously in John’s chest. Maybe some faith too, faith in the 9-year-old boy who he had trained and moulded and forced to grow up too fast.

John held on to the clear image of his strong soldier and tried to smother the sick twisted voice in the back of his head taunting him with the fact that Dean fitted the victim profile so perfectly and the grim truth that all the missing people had vanished without a trace, never to be found.

“Sam, you still there buddy?” John swallowed down his growing worry that was threatening to consume him and focused on keeping his youngest safe in the meantime.

_“Yeah Dad I’m here.”_

“Good, go into the bathroom and lock the door behind you okay? Don’t answer it for anyone but me. I’ll knock five times." The words were eerily similar to the words he told Dean every time he left them to fend for them selves....

  


  
**What should you do when I leave?** Salt the windows and doors.

  
**If I’m not back or you don’t hear from me?** Call Pastor Jim. Call Uncle Bobby. Call Caleb. (Call who ever you are speaking to this week.)

  
**What’s the most important thing?** Watch out for Sammy.

  


The same routine. Every. Single. Time. He hated those words and the weight they carried. And now here he was saying the same kind of things to Sam. _Too much on their shoulders, making them grow up two fast._ But John had to push it down, like everything else, and make sure his youngest son would follow his instructions.

"How many times will I knock Sammy?”

 _“Five.”_ Repeated the scared child.

“Good boy, I’m going to hang up now-“

 _“No Dad please!”_ Sam yelled over the phone so loud that John had to remove his ear from the speaker.

“Sam I need to, I’ll get to you quicker if I can concentrate on the road. And you need to lock yourself in the bathroom- you can’t take the phone in there, the cord will give away your position.”

 _“Daddy I’m scared…”_ It was Sam’s final plea, his voice was a small frightened whisper and it made John’s heart ache. Both himself and Dean had wrapped the 5-year-old up in cotton wool since he was 6 months old, he wasn’t trained for this. Sam had never been _alone_ in a situation like this.

“I know son, but I’ll be there very soon. Just right now I need you to be brave for me, can you do that?” John waited desperately for a reply.

 _“Yes sir.”_ The small spoken phrase was something he’d ingrained in Dean, but John slowly realised that this was the first time he had heard Sam say it. Pride and a bitter sadness welled in his stomach but he swallowed hard and continued saying goodbye to his son.

“I’ll be there before you know it, 20 minutes’ tops.” Said John in what he hoped was a reassuring tone, “Go into the bathroom Sammy and wait for me to knock, be safe.”

There was a small pause then a deep inhale of air from the other side of the line.

_“Okay Dad. Be quick.”_

John hung up before either one of them could say that word.

  


_Goodbye._

  


There was no time for that word, not in John’s life. There never had been and there never would.

The speed gage crept past 80mph as John stamped down hard on the gas, willing the car forward into the black night.

 

 

  


  


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

  


  


 

 

Emerald liquid danced in his vision. The green water surrounded the boy, covered him, soaked him to his very core and yet… He wasn’t drowning. But he was sure that he couldn’t be breathing either…

He floated in the water weightlessly, suspended by an invisible force. Looking around he caught glimpses of faint translucent figures moving slowly past him. Their hands caught his clothing and brushed against his skin but the coldness that he expected to feel from their touch never came. Instead they left a comforting warmth in their wake. The boy in the river had seen spirits before, many times, and none of them had ever possessed any kind of heat. 

  


Warmth was _human_ , warmth came from _within…_

  


The child’s eyes tried to focus on the faces of the wispy spirits but the water stopped him from doing so. Faintly he remembered opening his eyes a long time ago in a chlorine filled swimming pool and seeing nothing but the haze of people’s feet and feeling the burn of foreign water invading his unequipped naked eyes. In this river there was no stinging sensation, just like there was no breathing, but his vision still held that same haziness. A sense of frustration shot through him, he wanted to see the figures that floated down here in the green river. He wanted to see their faces and ask…

  


What did he want to ask?

  


_Why are you here?_

_Why am I here?_

_Where is…_

_Oh god where is…_

  


The end of a smooth wooden staff dropped down in front of him and started to slowly churn the river. His glaze followed the stick up towards the surface and discovered that it breached the top of the water where he could faintly see an outline of a creature of some sort who must be holding onto and controlling that branch of driftwood, perhaps controlling everything.

The polluting green light above them started to pulse.

There was a change in the current.

The moss-colored spirits started to speed up and move faster past him whilst he stayed still and frozen in the water. He was at the center of an awful whirlpool, the figures that inhabited the river with him were spinning around him roughly in the bubble of the water which was growing a deeper intense green. Suddenly he was glad that he couldn’t see their faces, he was convinced they must be screaming.

There was still warmth in their touch. They grabbed at him, clutched at his arms, his legs, his face… A hand latched onto his hair, pulled his head back and placed warm lips on his ear as if it were trying to whisper something to him but was quickly pulled away by the current.

One of the spirits seized the front of his jacket and pulled itself as close as it could to him before it was dragged away by the churning emerald water.

It gasped and shuddered, struggling to speak, but finally a muffled voice made it’s way to his ears… 

  


_“Don’t let it take you.”_

  


Then the grip was gone and the figure was pulled violently away from him with a piercing shriek.

He closed his eyes from the dizzying spirits, away from the alien green glow that invaded everything and the swirling flow of the water. Hands carried on reaching for him, trying to warn him…

  


_“No rest in this river.”_

_“Get out.”_

_“So young.”_

_“Only pain here.”_

  


He blocked the deafening screams of the dead out. He held on tightly to the silver coin in his right hand and prayed for an end to this, he didn’t want to be trapped here in the green river with the warm souls that would swim here for eternity.

A frantic hand scratched at his knuckles and tried to pry his fingers open, he moved his arm up protectively towards his chest and away from the attacker.

_“Drop the coin! You have to drop it!”_

But again the warm hands disappeared into the current. But he started to doubt everything, his grip on this nightmare reality was slipping and the questions boiled back up in his confused mind…

  


_Why am I here?_

_Where is…_

_Oh god where is…_

  


Who was it? Who had he left behind, who had he forgotten?

  


_“Dean…”_

This voice was clear and loud, it sliced through the water and his confusion, sending ripples into his brain. It was completely different to the desperate half-dead cries of the spirits that surrounded him, he knew that voice, it spoke his name. A blazing white light appeared and pierced through his eyelids, he didn’t dare to open his eyes as he was scared the brightness would blind him.

_“Dean hold on, be strong. I’m waiting for you.”_

He opened his mouth to speak and the emerald water flooded into his mouth, down his throat and into his lungs. But Dean didn’t choke, there was no pain here. For now at least. He held on to the voice and gargled into the water, not caring if his own words would be indecipherable in the deep river.

“Mom?” He tried to say but instead felt only bubbles emit from his mouth. 

  


Then all of a sudden, a soft hand was on his face. 

  


It was his mother, here at last. Gone for so long.

  


Dean leaned into her touch greedily, but as soon as he did he realised something was wrong. Unlike the other spirits the hand was freezing cold and lifeless, it spread a suffocating frost through his suspended body.

_“It’s okay Angel, we’ll be together soon. Just one more journey…”_

The boy shivered as the hand left him and the white light was replaced by the viridescent glow once more. Dean’s eyes flew open in a panic as pain leaked into his body and the water in his lungs started to throb and burn. 

  


The water was now still but there was movement from all around.

  


The green spirits surrounded him and moved his body so that the was lying parallel to the top of the river. They seemed to move robotically, not as freely as they had done when the current had broken them out of their peaceful swimming... Now it was as if someone was forcing them to do their bidding. Dean could see the outline of the man above the water, could see the bottom of his large boots as he too stood floating effortlessly in the river.

The spirits left Dean and returned to their slow dream-like circling of his body. However, the last one to leave him lingered close to his ear and whispered to him in that rotting death-rattle of a voice…

  


_“Remember who you’ve forgot."_

  


_"And do not trust the white light.”_

  


  


  


Hard wood hit his back suddenly and surrounded him like a coffin.

  


It pushed him upwards and Dean Winchester breached the surface of the river in a rotten black boat.

  


  


  



	8. Let’s Not Let Time’s Bitter Flood Rise

* * * * * *

#  ________________

  


  


The roar of an engine ripped through the stagnant and quiet night which the residents of Red River were enjoying. The sound belonged to John Winchester’s Chevy Impala, which miraculously had not been pulled over by a Police car during his race towards this one horse town. He had driven here in a complete daze, his inner auto pilot took over as his mind only thought about one thing- getting to Sam and Dean. The only issue that he faced was the small problem of the abduction of his eldest son. 

Also, if he was being completely honest with himself _(which he never was)_ , John couldn't even be sure that his youngest was still in the bathroom that he had told Sam to lock himself into just 17 minutes ago. The determined man tried to rid himself of the panic inducing dread the threatened to consume him as he drove past Shirley’s Diner, a garish but boarded up building that he remembered was close to where he had dumped his boys to go off on a hunt which he had abandoned without a second thought right after receiving Sam's phone call. Those strange disappearances had been driven out of his mind by the equally strange disappearance of his own son. A sly smarmy voice at the back of John's head whispered to him as streetlights flew past his window and his foot itched to press the gas pedal flat against the floor...

_You know it's not a coincidence right John? You left them there alone, this was just waiting to happen._

_Just a matter of time..._

Thankfully John could partially drown out that voice by focusing on the purr of the Impala and muttering a mantra to himself of insistances that he would find his children whilst he drew near to his destination. The guttural growl of the engine was cut off abruptly as he finally skidded into the parking lot of the motel which bared some generic name he couldn’t even remember. Strangely no faces appeared at any of the motel room’s windows at the sound of screeching tires, just like no lights had turned on in the houses that John had thundered past as he raced through the small town. Any other time the hunter would have been interested to know that his high speed driving woke not a single soul, but tonight he couldn’t care less.

  


Right now he only cared about finding his children, safe and sound.

  


John was out of the car in an instant and within two seconds he was kicking open the door to Room 34 with stone-faced solid efficiency.

“Sam?” He called out into the dark empty space which was illuminated an otherworldly soft blue from the blinking neon sign out front. The faint smell of gunpowder peppered the air. John took a step further into the room and past the threshold. Immediately after entering he heard the splashing of water and the crunch of glass.

The hunter looked down to see a shallow pool of water covering the entire floor. It was only a few centimetres deep but deep enough that it gave the ground below him a velvet smooth appearance. He was unsure if the water itself was green or whether it was just the color of the carpet beneath the liquid that gave it the strange murky green hue. John watched as the small ripples that he had caused by his presence disturbed the previously tranquil water. He reached for the light switch only to discover that it didn’t work, looking up he realized that the bulb had blown, which explained the smattering of glass he’d trod on. John cast his eyes down and surveyed the room again, his eyes eventually spotted the shotgun, which he always left behind in the closet in case Dean needed it for protection, discarded on the bed and his heart began to plummet further.

The whole scene was unnervingly disturbing, especially because only a couple of hours previously he had left Sam and Dean in this shabby room with a handful of supplies and a promise he would be back when the job was finished. He couldn’t have predicted that in the hours he had been gone everything would have turned to, for a lack of a better word, shit. John repressed the images that came to his mind of his two sons battling against an intruder alone and the deepening guilt that was blossoming in his gut. Instead of losing himself to that guilt he walked towards the closed bathroom door and felt a flittering feeling of hope as he spotted that the lock below the handle displayed one little word…

  


_Engaged._

  


“Sammy? You in there?” John asked again as he reached the door.

“Dad?” Came a small voice from behind the mahogany wood that sent relief flooding through his body.

“Yeah Sammy it’s me, you can open the door now.” He knelt down so that he would be at Sam’s height when his son emerged from the room.

The lock clicked open and the door slowly opened a crack. John could just about spot a fearful hazel eye, partially covered by strands of brown hair, peering at him through the small space. The eye blinked once, taking him in, then suddenly the door flung open and John was nearly sent flying by the 5-year-old boy who crashed into his arms.

“DAD- DAD HE TOOK D-DEAN THEY LEFT HE MADE ME S-SLEEP AND DEAN WAS, HE WAS GONE WHEN I WOKE UP! WE GOTTA FIND HIM DAD P-PLEASE WE HAVE TO GO _NOW!_ ” Sam yelled into John’s chest, tears streamed down his young face as he was caught between clutching onto his father and dragging them both towards the door to find Dean.

“Woah Sammy shhhh it’s okay, we’ll find him. It’s okay son, it’s okay.” Comforted John as he cupped Sam’s face and wiped some of the tears away from his eyes. “I need to know what happened Sammy. The man who came for Dean was that old tramp who came to the car window right?”

“Y-yeah it was the scary man.” Nodded Sam as he sniffled, “Dean was being scary too before, he had a coin he wouldn’t share and he shouted at me. Then the light ‘sploded and I hid under the bed...”

“A coin?” Interrupted John, “What coin?”

“I don’t know!” Cried Sam desperately, “The man said he gave it to Dean, said he needed it. But that don’t matter, we have to go!” The boy stood up and tugged at John’s hand, trying to pull him towards the door but John easily yanked him back, spun Sam around and placed his large calloused hands on Sam’s little shoulders.

“Listen Sammy, _everything_ matters. You don’t know where he took Dean, do you? So you need to tell me what happened so we can work out where he might be, we’ll be no help to Dean if we start wandering around aimlessly will we?” Sam opened his mouth to argue but seemed to think better of it and nodded sullenly. John gave a relieved sigh, he didn’t like putting Sam through this but he had to. “Okay. Did the man say anything else? Like his name or what he needed Dean for?”

“H-He wanted to take Dean to get some rest, that he wanted it- he wanted to be with Mom. And Dean… He needed the coin to pay Charon to take him to-“

“Charon?” The grip John had on Sam’s shoulders got tighter as the name set of a dozen alarm bells in his head, “He said his name was Charon?”

“Ow Dad you’re hurting me.” This son squirmed in John's grip but he gave Sam a little shake to prompt him to answer.

“Sammy! His name was Charon?”

“Yes! He said he was a sailor, but we’re not even by the sea are we?” Muttered Sam, clearly thinking the name was unimportant. John let go of Sam and stood up, he knew that name and the implications of it made the color drain from John’s face.

  


The older Winchester remembered reading about Charon in that old dusty book about Greek Mythology which Bobby Singer had forced him to read during his crash-course of all things supernatural. However, he did protest that reading about quote _"jumped up fairy tales'"_ was a waste of his time. At the time the then rookie hunter had thought it would be pretty unlikely that he would ever hunt a God or anything like those kind of creatures. He had seriously doubted that they even existed but as Bobby quite rightly said to him _“Where do you think the stories come from then?”._ In those early days of hunting his mind was purely focused on anything connected to the fire that had claimed his wife’s life, but now after 5 years of dead ends his M.O had extended to killing anything he could find and saving people from the same fate that had befallen his own family. He now appreciated the education that Singer had given him- despite the fact he would never say that to the crotchety old man’s face. 

From what he remembered from the book Charon was the name of the Ferryman of The Dead, a lesser daimōn God who transported souls across the shores of the underworld to Haides. The passengers on his boat paid with an obol, a Greek coin, which was inserted into the deceased mouth before burial for their final journey in death. Bobby had mentioned that Charon’s role was especially important as those who couldn’t pay him where left to roam the earth as ghosts and that he served the same purpose as western notions of the Grim Reaper. For some reason John’s mind wandered to the image of a faded painting that had been above the text on Charon, in his minds eye he could see an old bearded man in a small boat taking a coin out of the mouth of a young maiden. Though he hadn’t thought much about the picture at the time John recalled the strange white figures in the shrubbery behind the river, which to him looked like lost souls calling out to the woman. Maybe warning her that all wasn’t what it seemed…

Perhaps it was unwise to set sail with Charon, who knew what he did with those souls that were his to deliver?

As John pondered on that disturbing thought Sam’s childish logic started to echo in his head…

_**“He said he was a sailor, but we’re not even by the sea are we?”** _

"Out of the mouths of babes." Muttered John, the phrase was something his mother had been fond of saying and now that he had children of his own he found that the expression got truer every day. 

  


_No Sammy they were not near the sea, Charon didn’t sail on the ocean._

_**He sailed on rivers.** _

  


John felt a rush of adrenaline and purpose run through him. The river, _Red River_. He had been simultaneously blind and overwhelmingly stupid but the hunter had no time to rake himself over the coals of his failures. Right now all he wanted was to sprint out of this flooded wreck of a room towards his missing son but he held back for a second to address his youngest. John knelt back down and placed his hands on Sam’s shoulder’s once again, “I know where Dean is Sam, I’ll bring him back safe. But I need you to lock yourself back in the bathroom.”

“No!” Sam protested, “I’m coming with you!”

“Sammy it might be dangerous, Dean’s already missing and I…” He hung his head and stopped short of saying I don’t want to lose you too. John sighed and looked into his son’s eyes which were so similar to his own, “Sammy you gotta be brave for just a little while longer, I know it’s scary but I need to find your brother.”

Sam’s bottom lip started to tremble but instead of crying he took in a deep breath and straightened his back in a way he’d seen Dean do before when he needed to be brave. “Okay Dad, just get him back.”

The hunter gave his son a broken smile and pulled him into a hug, thankfully Sam didn’t see John’s watering eyes as he hastily wiped them away behind Sam’s back. It was hard to let go but time was of the essence, he stood up and reached for the discarded shotgun on the bed. 

“Sammy I’m going to leave this in the bathroom with you but you’re only to use it if absolutely necessary right? I’ll be back as soon as possible with Dean I promise just stay in the room and don’t answer to anyone but me, got that buddy?”

“Yeah Dad.” Said Sam. He stared at his father, considered him for a moment and then said those two words that Dean normally told him before he left for a hunt, "Be careful." 

Before John could say anything back to his son Sam toddled over beside the bed and picked up something the hunter couldn’t see before he willingly walked into the bathroom. The little boy stood in the doorway looking up at his father, his eyes betraying the fear that he was feeling but his small hand was gripped tightly around two sodden books, John recognised one as Dean’s old exercise book and the other as the children’s Coloring Book that Dean had pestered him into buying for Sam only last week. Looking at Sam trying his best to be unafraid in the face of all that had happened tonight and what may still come John tried his hardest not to break down himself, he needed to stay strong for his boys.

“Okay Sammy, stay safe.” John started to close the door but Sam stopped it with one of his pale little hands.

“Wait Dad,”

“Sam-“ John was close to bolting the door with a chain if Sam put up anymore protests but to his surprise the boy wasn’t trying a last-ditch attempt to come with him...

  


Instead Sam simply said, “Look for the footsteps outside.” And then pulled the door shut and locked it.

  


John stood dumb founded at the closed door for a second before shaking his head and running out of the room. 

  


  


Once again he was in the clear night air, he disregarded Sam’s cryptic words whilst he quickly raided the trunk of the Impala for weapons he thought would work on Charon. He looked up absent mindlessly as he loaded his rifle and stared at the large blue motel sign that polluted everything around it with a cobalt glow. The sign read:

  


T e Riv rbed M tel

  


John translated the sign from Broken Neon (which he was well-versed in) into English and realised that the name of this 'grand' old place was The Riverbed Motel. John Winchester would have laughed if he wasn’t so out of his mind with worry, plus lately he’d had it up to here with the unfair irony that his life seemed to attract.

After taking every weapon he could think of that could be helpful he cast his eyes down to the concrete slabs that made a walkway around the motel rooms and noticed three sets of footprints all coming from Room 34. One was his own that lead to where he was standing now but the other two, with one pair considerably smaller than the other, led out towards the woods at the back of the building. John knelt down to inspect the footprints, they looked fresh when by all means his should have faded by now. The other two should have dried ages ago as he vaguely recalled Sam mentioning footprints during his frantic phonecall to John. He looked closer at the water that pooled around the prints and noticed that it had the same strange emerald quality that the eerie water that lay in the motel room. It looked completely fresh. Untouched.

John drew his shoulders back and stood up once more.

“I’ll get him back Mary.” Muttered the hunter as he ran his thumb over his golden wedding ring. He glanced at the small imprints of Dean's worn out sneakers and sighed heavily, trying to summon up just a little bit of hope.

  


“Just hold on Dean.”

  


Finally John allowed himself to break into an all out sprint.

The man ran next to his son’s footsteps and followed them into the dark foreboding woods which swallowed him whole.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \+ The painting that John remembers is Charon And Psyche by John Roddam Spencer Stanhope
> 
> \+ a daimōn is different to a demon- they are normally guides, forces of nature, or deities. But this version of Charon... He's a little twisted..


	9. To the Banks Over Rivers of Pain

* * * *

#  ________________

  


  


The spindly branches of the trees grabbed at him as he ran through the underbrush. Their brittle wooden arms snagged on his clothing, trying to slow his progress, but John ploughed on. The untouched footprints that had led him into these woods ended when the concrete of the motel's pathway turned into damp soil. As the hunter dashed and weaved through the natural obstacles his eyes darted frantically for a sign of movement or a hint of a trail. His flashlight cut through the darkness, carving out thin sharp lines of harsh illumination that offered him no direction. Towards his left John heard a crunching of leaves and quickly directed the flashlight towards the source of the noise. 

A brown hare stared directly at him, frozen in the light. The animal’s black eyes widened and dilated as they faced off against each other. Prey and hunter, creature and man. In a moment of contemplation John wondered if they had both disturbed each other whilst carrying out the same mission.Surely the hare was on its way back to its burrow, back to its children, just like John was constantly trying to do. But these days that task was getting harder and harder. 

He was nothing more than a monster to that animal, an obstacle in its path, and after a few moments of being caught in the hare’s disconcerting stare John moved the flashlight away, freeing them both. 

His heavy boots ambled on into the forest but he soon found it easier to manoeuvre through the shrubbery, the trees were thinning and a new unnatural light was pulsing through the sparse branches. The brightening and dimming green light drew him closer to the edge of the woods. John quickly staggered out of the concealing trees and turned off his flashlight in a daze. 

  


The scene he happened across was like nothing he had ever seen before.

  


He had reached the riverside and the small forest was now behind him. The damp malleable earth sunk slightly under his weight as he looked out upon the river and stared at a figure who was conducting the green light, who was conducting everything. Recognition registered in John’s immobile mind, it sluggishly supplied him with the memory of his own livid hands clutching onto a damp tattered coat and staring furiously into a time-worn face with a sunken eye….

The man before him was that old tramp who had lunged into his car alright, just like his youngest son had told him, but this time he did not look nearly as old or pathetic this time round. The otherworldly figure in the middle of the river radiated deathly power and seemed to command the water surrounding him. He stood on a charred black rowboat holding a driftwood staff upon which floated a green orb that was bathing the area in an awful emerald glow. 

  


That figure was Charon, ferryman of the dead, and it looked as though he was preparing for a journey. 

  


Beneath the water John swore he saw bodies floating in circles around the boat. He unshouldered his rifle with unease but when the green light once again pulsed brighter he saw the transparent figures more clearly… The hunter shuddered as he realized that they were spirits but, by the looks of their calm faces and softly closed eyes, not vengeful ones. John knew they shouldn't be trapped here, that someone was keeping them tethered to the land of the living and John didn't need three guesses to work out who. His heart lurched at the sight of them all endlessly encircling their captor, never finding peace, never completing their journey, just forever baring witness to Charon’s next sacrifice on a new river.

John almost wanted to close his eyes and run for fear that a familiar figure would swim into view, one that looked like his son. He held his breath as he watched each faint comatose face circle Charon's boat but thankfully yet somehow alarmingly Dean did not appear. 

He let out a shaky breath of relief just as the black boat started to turn with the current of the churning water. Charon remained oblivious to John's presence, instead his gaze was focused on something inside the boat that the high bow of the vessel was blocking from John's view. 

The river was becoming more unsettled as the black rowboat turned to face the hunter. Once more the light from Charon's staff grew more intense, illuminating the boat, the surrounding depthless water and revealing something John would have given anything not to see.

A small body lay across the bottom of the rowboat. 

The hunter’s rifle dropped to the ground as the boy’s face was revealed, bathed in the unearthly green light…

  


It was his son. Drenched and unmoving. 

  


“ **DEAN!** ”

The yell escaped his mouth before he could stop it. The 9-year-old didn’t respond to John’s cry but the old man looming over him sure did.

Charon’s withered face, like Dean's, was illuminated a sickly green by the light of his staff. His one visible eye bore into John’s with the strength of a thousand and his voice floated with ease across the river as he smiled serenely at the dazed hunter.

“I had a feeling that you may interrupt.” The old man sighed mockingly, feigning annoyance. The look on his face told another story and betrayed the fact that he was enjoying this. After his false look of annoyance his lips parted to reveal his rotting yellow teeth in a sham of a smile as if he was glad his entertainment for the night had arrived.

“Well you were damn right-- Dean! Can you hear me?” John called to his son once more, willing his head to lull, his legs to shift, for his right hand that was clenched so tightly to open… Just anything to show that he wasn’t…

“He won’t wake up John.” The hunter watched the man’s lips move from where he stood on the charred boat in the middle of the river but despite the distance Charon’s voice whispered into his ear, as if he was standing right next to John. 

“He’s not dead.” Denied John venomously, refusing to believe that his son maybe gone already.

Charon stared down at Dean’s comatose body and his smile faded.

“He is and he is not.” Came his ambiguous reply.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Shouted John from the riverside, his hand starting to move behind him as inconspicuously as he could as he tried to plan his attack. 

“Those who are about to die are dead John.” As Charon spoke the hunter tried to slowly unsheathe his silver blade, “Your son has been on the verge of death a while now and you know it. You cannot save him now, but you can grant him peace.”

“Is that what you told him huh? What you told all these people?” John gestured to the sad figures in the river, “Peace? Don’t lie to me you son of a bitch, you murdered them all by promising to get rid of their pain- by luring them with their loved ones. The rest you promise them isn’t real, instead of taking them away to new shores you turned them into obedient spirits that float under your waters for your next sacrifice!”

“That is peace to the wondering lost souls I have taken. It’s preferable to their miserable little lives on this earth.” The old Man knelt down and peered at the spirits as if he was watching fish in an aquarium, “In their death they dream of the ones they have lost, they only awaken when I need their power...”

He stood back up with the ease of a man half his age. Though knowing that the creature before him had lived for centuries, half of his age would still be immensely old. 

Charon turned his piercing eye onto John once more, “Look at their faces. I know you’ve seen them before…”

He lifted the wooden staff aloft and in response the spirits rose from the water and surrounded the rowboat. The pitiful figures started to spin as they had done in the water but now that they were above the river John could make out a few of their features… It took a few moments but John recognised some of them from the photos that accompanied the missing person’s files.

“Don’t they look so much happier?” Came Charon’s clear voice from the center of the rotating spirits.

John didn’t know if the creature was delusional or simply taunting him because nobody in their right mind would describe the opaque faces of those poor dead people as happy.

Suddenly the figures dropped back down into the dark water without a sound. They did not disturb the surface of the river at all, they only returned to slowly circling Charon’s boat like the condemned lost souls that they were. John could see the old man once more who was standing once again and he glared at the wicked grin that was plastered on his face. Anger boiled up inside of him, he wouldn’t let his son become one of those spirits. He would rather die.

“I came here for my son." He forced out through gritted teeth, "Not for them.”

“Oh I don’t think that is entirely true John.” Taunted Charon from the small rowboat.

“How do you know who I am?” John asked, quite taken aback at the sound of his own name and the old man’s assumption.

The old man threw his head back and laughed savagely. Despite the sudden movement, that would have under any normal circumstances caused the boat to overturn, it stayed perfectly still. 

“I know that you were unknowingly hunting me and that you _wanted_ to save them all John. Don’t lie to me I know you did, you always do. You want to save _everybody_ , as if it would make any difference, as if it would change the past... But they are already saved. They all came willingly… Just like Dean here.” Charon knelt back down but this time he stretched out a wrinkled hand towards John’s motionless son and swept the child’s damp golden hair out of his face.

Instantly John let go of the hilt of his knife and he knelt too. All of his thoughts violently turned to finding a long range weapon so he could hurt the monster who was horribly close to Dean. The hunter bent down to retrieve his fallen rifle and quickly aimed it at Charon’s head in a surge of protectiveness.

“Don’t touch him.” Warned John, his finger already on the trigger.

“Your bullets won’t harm me hunter.” Said Charon with an unworried ease that enraged John even further, so much so that before he knew it he had fired a warning shot which wasn’t a warning shot at all.

  


John had sent a bullet straight through the arm that had touched Dean. Both he and Charon gazed at the hole that had been blasted out of the old man’s withdrawing hand. 

  


Slimey green blood flowed from the wound and dripped onto Dean’s chest. Neither of them moved. John didn’t even dare breathe for fear of what Charon may do in response. But John needn’t have been worried, the old man merely chuckled at the wound and turned towards John with that irritating look of amusement plastered on his lopsided face.

“Like father like son.” Charon showed no signs of pain as he continued to taunt John, “Sam attempted to harm me too, when I came to collect Dean from that motel room. Put up quite a fight, much more than his brother here… l’ll tell you what I told little Sammy…”

The emerald water below the boat started to ripple and bubble.

“I wouldn’t get in my way.”

  


As John started intently at the small boat he noticed signs of life coming from his son. His clenched hand started to loosen and the hunter swore that he saw a faint glow emanating from inside it.

“ _DEAN!_ CAN YOU HEAR ME?” Cried John as his feet started to move towards the boat, wading through the mud that bordered the side of the river with ease.

“Do not worry, his suffering will come to an end, he’ll be with his mother. The child will be at peace.” Charon called placatingly from the boat, John noticed that he had knelt back down over Dean’s stirring body.

“I don’t give a fuck about your kind of peace. Get away from my son!” He bellowed at the creature whilst he waded into the river. Piercing cold water soaked John through in an instant but it didn’t stop him, in fact the shock of the icy river only strengthened and reminded him that he had to reach his son before Charon could turn him into one of those ghostly figures. The same figures that had unnervingly stopped their encircling of the black rowboat.

“Do not venture into this river John Winchester,” Warned Charon as he aimed his driftwood staff towards the advancing hunter. In response the souls in the water rose up once more but this time only their heads breached the top of the water so that they were on right on level with John’s, ready to attack. 

“My spirits will prevent you from interfering.” And at Charon’s word’s they sluggishly lined up in front of the boat, forming a blockade. 

John, who was now so deep in the river his feet couldn’t touch the ground, couldn’t care less.

  


“Let them.”

  


There was a single moment of calm where the hunter, the daimōn, and the spirits all stood their ground, waiting for each other to strike… 

  


Then many things happened at once.

  


The inky green water that surrounded them all was the catalysis; it had been bubbling uneasily ever since John had entered it but suddenly the angry ripples stilled. The river instantly calmed, it’s surface became a depthless black mirror and as John looked down into it he saw the faces of the spirits reflected in the emerald water. His stomach turned as he noticed the change that had over taken them all and with great effort he tore his eyes away from the reflections to look upon the real figures that had lined up against him. 

Their previously calm peaceful faces had morphed and changed into rotting rabid looking skulls. Hair hung loosely from their heads, skin drooped from faces revealing the bone beneath, their eyes were unseeing and their wispy white translucency had turned into a sickly lime green shade. They truly looked like an army of the dead, Charon had revealed their real form and John finally saw the spirits for what they were. All that talk of _peace_ and _rest_... There was none, not for these monsters.

Just as the hunter readied himself to fight he saw Charon raise his staff high above his head in a commanding and foreboding manner. The green light that emitted from the long length of driftwood grew stronger once more. In fact, it became so strong that John moved his hand up to his face to shield his eyes for fear it would blind him. 

  


The bright light bled through his eyelids and his heart began to beat faster as he heard movement from all around him.

  


John felt a breeze whip against his face. A sudden wind picked up as a wild current started to churn the river, starting the beginnings of a whirlpool.

  


“It’s time.” Spoke Charon.

  


Then the light that blazed behind his eyelids vanished, plunging them all into darkness.

 

 

  


  


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

  


  


 

 

_The woman called to the child through the haze and the blinding white light._

  


_She was beautiful, just as he remembered. But he was starting to forget something else... Something important..._

  


_He couldn't see clearly, everything was covered in the white haze. Even her face was masked by it and he wanted to see her face more than anything else._

  


_"I see you Dean, just come closer, come into the light." She whispered to him, her welcoming arms outstretched..._

  


_But it was growing colder and his lungs felt full and heavy. And there was another voice coming from further away which sounded more solid, more real than his mothers._

It was deeper too, a voice that sparked something within him- a need to respond.

  


_He tried to speak but nothing came out but water._

  


_It was everywhere. He was drowning in it._

  


  


_Water, water, everywhere and all the boards did shrink._

_Water, water, everywhere nor any drop to drink._

__

  


  


_There was something burning hot in his hand despite the cold that was seeping into his core. He clung to it like an anchor._

  


_"That's good Dean, you'll need that... Just come closer. It'll all be over soon..."_

  


_But he didn't want her anymore, the familiar shouts came once more and he tried to pinpoint it's source, or who it belonged to. He wanted to answer...._

  


_The fog willed him forward, clouding everything, pushing him into her arms._

  


_There was no heat from her, she was just as cold as him. The only heat came from the object in his hand._

_"Soon. You'll know what to do. Then we will rest." The woman who was familiar and unfamiliar spoke in his ear._

  


_But he felt nothing but numbness._

  


  


_The light was going out._

  


_Then in the darkening glow he saw her._

  


_He saw her **true** face._

__

_It was skeletal. A horrible mask. Tinged pale green and decaying. And he realised..._

  


_His mother was dead. She was gone and had been for a long time._

  


He didn't know who this monster was.

  


_Then the water was there again, in his mouth and lungs, clinging to his entire body. Despite this he could feel his eyelids fluttering and the feel of wood beneath his back._

  


_His body shifted into consciousness._

  


_And Dean Winchester woke up to absolute chaos._

  



	10. You Were The Boat That Breached

* * *

#  ________________

  


  


His eyes fluttered open to a spinning night sky. 

  


The 9-year-old tried to orient himself, willing the world to stop moving and the buzzing to leave his ears. The shadowy mist that had made a home inside his head was proving hard to escape, every fibre of his being willed him to close his eyes again and surrender to it. 

  


_Come back, you’ll come back to me soon…_

  


Her voice echoed in his mind and he wanted rid of it, he was sick of it shrouding everything, skewing reality and clouding his judgement. Most of all he hated the fact that it could leak through the cracks and reach him in the real world. 

Because that’s where he was now. He was back in the real world, but the boy soon found out it was just as confusing as the white fog had been. 

Dean felt the wood of a small boat beneath him digging into his back. As he shifted a little to ease his aching joints he realised that his clothes were dripping wet as though he had been submerged in water... 

  


__

_“No rest in this river.”_

  


__

_“Get out.”_

  


__

_“So young.”_

  


__

_“Only pain here.”_

  


Unearthly voices echoed in his head as the dampness of his clothes started to affect him. The drenched material weighed heavy on his body and smothered him in cold like an iron straight jacket. He started to shiver in response to the sub-zero temperature so he once again tightened his grip on the small coin in his hand. The object was still weirdly producing heat like it had done in the dream he had just awoken from, providing him with a morsel of warmth that he could cling onto. Dean didn’t question the strange sensation at this precise moment because he was too busy trying to work out the other strange things that were happening to him. Number one being why the boat he was laying in was spinning so violently... 

And also, now that the low buzzing in his ears had subsided, he started to wonder why he heard a symphony of ferocious splashes, shouts and even laughter coming from all around him. 

After escaping from his own thoughts, fear flooded his senses as he started to recognise both of the voices that screamed and laughed in tandem. 

The boy reached out his left hand and clutched onto the side of the boat to lever himself up into a sitting position. His fingertips griped onto the blackened wood but as he did so he instantly wanted to pull his arm away. The wood under his hand was slimy and soggy, completely rotten and waterlogged. It was awful to touch but Dean needed the extra support to get at least some of his body up off of the floor of the small boat so that he could see what was going on around him and work out how much trouble he was in. As the 9 year-old pulled himself up he felt the wood give and a considerable chunk came away from the side. 

Dean gasped in pain as the jagged splinters tore into his hand, he looked down and noticed that the palm was bleeding sluggishly. The vivid red blood stood out in sharp contrast against his ghostly pale skin, as the young boy stared at his injury he noticed the strange green glow that was bathing the area surrounding the boat and it’s source seemed to be coming from right above him. Now that he came to think of it, the laughter he had heard ( _which he was **still** hearing_ ) came from above him too. 

  


A shadow fell across the small boy as the boat turned again... 

Dean slowly moved his head up to look at the figure that was looming over him. 

  


The old man, who was looking more ancient and decayed than ever, beamed down at him. His driftwood staff that emanated the powerful light dimmed again, creating a shadow that plunged the left side of his face into darkness and blocked his missing eye from sight- but that only made his remaining one glisten in glee. 

“You’re ready.” Charon said, his voice booming over the commotion that came from nearby. 

Dean was held in the man’s gaze for a moment but he ripped himself from his piercing glare to instead look out across the water that surrounded him. He glanced around desperately, trying to pinpoint the source of the thrashing and frantic splashes that surely meant that someone was fighting in the water near to the small boat. And he knew that person, _didn’t he?_ He'd recognized the voice that shouted _to_ him, not _for_ him like the woman had done, when he had been lost in the white light of the fog… 

  


“DEAN!” Came a gargled cry from close by, grabbing his attention. The boy snapped his head around towards the sound of that voice... The voice of his father. 

  


John Winchester was trapped in the middle of a swarm of emaciated dead-eyed figures who wrestled and pushed each other to grab at the hunter. They swiped at him with long scrawny hands, leaving his clothes torn and his face laden with scratch marks, whilst they pulled him to and fro like a doll. Some dragged his head down into the black water and just when Dean thought he would never re-emerge he breached the surface, gasping and spitting out water, only to be attacked by the other dozen spirits that surrounded him. Despite the onslaught of opponents he faced, John swung and kicked at each and every one that came within reaching distance of him whilst all the while trying to force his way closer to the boat. 

However, it was clear to Dean that John was fighting a losing battle. He looked exhausted and each time he was pulled below, it took longer and longer for him to reappear. The child knew that his father couldn’t take much more. 

“We had a guest Dean, but not to worry, he won’t disturb us.” Charon chuckled into his ear as Dean watched on in horror. John was currently fighting to get out of the hold that one of the awful dead creatures had him in. 

“Please, please make them stop.” Dean whispered, his eyes not leaving his father’s tired face. 

“Oh it will stop. I can call them off whenever I choose. But I don’t know why you’d want to spoil the fun Dean, after all they are your friends.” 

“My friends?” Croaked Dean in confusion. 

“Yes of course they are, you were swimming with them before- remember? They were so peaceful weren’t they?” Smiled the old man. 

And at his words Dean remembered sinking into water and seeing translucent figures travelling past him in their sleep. Their faces relaxed and calm, resting. Their bodies warm but devoid of life. Until... Until something shifted. The current had changed and they had grabbed at him, tried to warn him... They'd yelled and screeched... 

  


__

_“Don’t let it take you.”_

  


__

_“Remember who you’ve forgot."_

  


__

_"And do not trust the white light.”_

  


“T-they’re the s-spirits?” Dean asked in disbelief, not wanting to accept that those warm souls had turned into the violent creatures that were attacking John. 

“Yes. They are… But never mind them Dean. Never mind your father, never mind all of it!" Cried Charon as he waved his hand indifferently as if this all was just a sideshow distracting Dean from the main event, "What matters now is _your_ decision here and _your_ journey. I promised you I would take your soul across the water into the underworld, to the other side… Someone is waiting for you to join her and both you and I, and even your dear old dad, know who that person is…” 

It didn't even need to be said but Dean mouthed that three letter word regardless. 

_“Mom.”_

Once again Charon smiled knowingly, "Yes Dean. It is finally time. I can take you, give you serenity and eternal rest away from all this pain and suffering.” 

Then suddenly the smile was gone, leaving no trace of it behind. Now the old man's face was a dangerous and powerful mask. 

  


“But only if you place that coin in your mouth.” He said with monotoned simplicity. Dean was taken aback at the ridiculousness of the sentence and for a moment he was completely struck dumb. 

  


“W-what?” Spluttered the boy as he pushed himself further away from Charon, wanting to escape all this madness. 

“I know it seems an odd request.” Consoled the old man. 

“Why? What will it do?” 

“It will pay me for my service and will grant your soul a save passage to-“ 

“I DON’T _CARE!_ Stop saying that!" Thundered Dean at the creature who stood above him in the small rowboat and the boy realised that the vessel had stopped spinning. Maybe it had stopped sometime ago or maybe right this second... Either way the world around him suddenly felt more real without the disorientating feeling of being in the center of a whirlpool. He was sick of the games, it was as if Charon was trying to wear Dean down even further and he had had enough. Surely the God of the Underworld could see that he was already broken? 

"I just want it to stop." Dean hung his head in exhaustion. 

“I know child." Consoled Charon and Dean felt the boat move as he knelt down in front of him, "I’m sorry Dean but I will take you on your journey, you’ve been marked. Condemned.” 

_Condemned._ That one word hit him harder than anything else Charon had said during this terrible night. Because that word encapsulated exactly how Dean felt and no one could ever know how deeply he felt it. 

It was bone deep, the strength of his condemnation ran through his veins. Charon had seen it, he must have, because Dean had known that he was cursed ever since he was 5 years old. All of the Winchesters had, in their own equally miserable ways. But Charon didn’t go after Sam, who was also a motherless child that was already starting to show signs that he was slowly starting to become broken down by their nomad lifestyle just like Dean. And Charon didn’t go for John, who was devastated by his wife’s death and then consequently threw himself and his sons into the world of the supernatural which only added to his grief, shame and guilt. No, despite all this Charon, the guider of souls, went for Dean Winchester. 

And that proved to the small boy that the dark spot that marked his soul was never going to go away… 

There was only one thing left to do. But if he was doomed, he wanted to know what he was in for. 

  


“So is-is that how I change? Is that how I turn into…” Dean drew a trembling breath and glanced at the spirits that held his father in their grasp, three bony hands were clasped over John's mouth preventing him from interrupting. The boy looked away and instead stared down at the hand that clasped the coin and whispered, “I don’t want to become one of those things.” 

“Hmm, it is unfortunate that you’ve seen them in this form…" Murmured Charon placatingly, "But you saw them before… That is their normal state. A state of peace… They all have their own loved ones in the white fog, they stay with them forever. And you can have that too Dean. In your own rest with your own loved one. She is waiting just as I promised. You could be with her in the white light Dean… Finally reunited with your mother... There is just one thing you need to do.” 

A wizened slimy hand tapped Dean's clenched fist and made Dean's skin crawl. 

“This is the final act.” 

For a few seconds they both looked down at Dean’s hand in silence. 

“It has given you strength and comfort hasn’t it?" Came Charon's voice once more, "You let go of that coin and you’ll feel nothing but cold. All that loneliness Dean, don’t you remember that? If you let go that emptiness you have in your soul will only get bigger and bigger…” 

Dean looked out onto the calm river, away from the struggles of his father and the horrible spirits that had him in their clutches. He wanted to get away from the old man's convincing voice as well but there was no escaping his words... 

“You will never get rid of that emptiness Dean. It has a way of sneaking up behind you, wrapping it’s tentacles around your body until you can’t breathe, until you can’t feel anything else but it’s slimy clutches…” Charon’s voice trickled into his ear like honey, convincing and corrupting him in equal measure.

“And before you know it suddenly it’s dragging you down into the murky depths and it won’t ever let you go. But you come with me Dean, I can keep you safe from that, you come with me. You’ll be at peace…” The tone that the monster used was sincere but what Dean couldn’t see was the smirk that adorned his smug face.

  


Across the river John watched the monster spoke to his child whilst the hunter continued to fight to remain above water so that he wouldn’t miss a single thing. He struggled in the spirit's hold and bit at skeletal hands that were preventing him from yelling Dean's name. All he could do was hope to god that his son could see the irony in what the monster was saying and sense the pure hypocrisy of his words. 

But Dean was still just a kid in the end and any child faced with that kind of choice… Well, they would have willingly gone with Charon a long time ago. 

But Dean hadn’t. 

John highly doubted that any of the creature’s previous victims had taken this much persuading, and so he took what little comfort he could from that as he watched the events unfold before him- completely powerless. 

  


Aboard the boat that was the focus of these events the 9 year old boy and the daimōn God sat facing each other in silence. Both seemingly contemplating what was going to happen next.

A deadly stillness had settled over everything but was interrupted by the boy raising his right fist and tearing his gaze away from the empty side of the lake to instead stare at the tight grip he had on the coin which was so fierce that his knuckles were an even whiter shade of pale than the rest of his skin…

His long unclipped nails had been digging into the palm of his hand for hours but Dean didn’t even feel the pain, even as his green eyes followed the four thin trails of blood that flowed down his wrist and joined into one only to soak into his damp jacket sleeve.

The only thing that the boy felt in his grasped hand was a circular shape which he knew to be his coin. It was his only source of heat between his clammy damp clothes and the freezing air that surrounded him. Charon was completely right, it had been a comfort to him ever since he had found it in his pocket and the thought of dropping it, losing it, or above all placing it into his mouth, seemed completely absurd. A glowing red light escaped between the small cracks in his curled up fingers and instilled Dean with even more warmth and security- two things that he had been severely lacking in his life. The light wasn’t the sickly green that Charon wielded, nor the dreamlike and untrustworthy white light that the faint figure of his mother had resided in… It was an orange red that contrasted harshly with his surroundings, but somehow seemed to be the only thing that didn't pose any threat to him at all. 

He was shaken free of his thoughts as he felt the boat rock once more. The boy looked up to see that Charon had stood up again to tower over Dean in an ominous show of power.

“Dean, you can do this. You can let everything go…” Previously the creature’s words had meant to encourage him, tempt him and convince him, but now they seemed like they had been nothing more than instructions this whole time. Dean was beginning to see through Charon’s multiple charades however before he could start thinking rationally his body started to give into the icy cold seeped into his limbs from his saturated clothes. It was as if something had sensed his doubt and had retaliated by exposing him to the hypothermia he should by all means be suffering from.

“I- I-“ Dean stammered as his teeth chattered together in the enclosing frost that was quickly beginning to consume his whole body. 

“Just place the coin in your mouth child.” Said Charon serenely, but he glared down at Dean with hidden malice in his eyes.

“It will end…” He promised. 

  


_“We’ll be together soon. Just one more journey…”_

  


Dean remembered when the white light had started to fade, when he caught a glimpse of a rotting dead face that had masqueraded as his mother. But the spirits had warned him... 

  


_"Do not trust the white light.”_

  


And his father had always told never to listen to monsters. But he'd been listening to these creatures all night, their words swam circles in Dean's confused mind and he started to wonder... Who _was_ the true monster in this river?

  


Who could he believe?

  


Eventually Dean Winchester made up his mind. It was time. No more _nightmares_. No more _games_. Charon was right, this was going to end.

  


 

The boy glanced down once more at his hand and slowly pried his fingers open with his left. As he did so the red light became brighter as the coin came into view between his fingers and his blooded palm, it shone around the disc like a halo but as soon as it was exposed to the air it started to dim. 

As the light disappeared so did the warmth that had flowed into Dean’s arm and sustained his ailing body. Bitter cold replaced his last source of heat and dean quickly realised that the coin had been the only thing that had been stopping him from feeling any pain intensely. 

Suddenly water built up in his throat, forcing it’s way up his windpipe. He coughed and spluttered as the delayed effects of his near drowning caught up with him. His body folded inwards on it's self as he gagged on the rancid river water, all the while he continued to try and keep a hold of the precious coin- his one way ticket. But suddenly it was forgotten as a new wave of pain shot through his head, forcing visions of a terrified 5 year old, of peaceful then vengeful spirits and a dead mother that wouldn't stop beckoning him closer, to flash before his eyes.

Dean vaguely heard someone shouting his name in the distance over his painful retching and the deafening ringing that had started up again in his ears. The numb pain of his palm flared up too but it paled in comparison to the all-encompassing cold that tore into his whole body. 

  


This was it, he was dying. The red light was gone and he was dying. 

  


“The coin. The coin!” Dean heard a muffled voice through the ringing that was louder than the one before, it came from above him and he opened his scrunched up eyes to peer at the man it belonged to. 

Charon stood there, gesturing madly at the coin that was in danger of slipping out of Dean’s trembling hand. 

The man had promised an end to all this, he just had one job to do- then it was over. 

  


He could do this. He _had_ to.

  


The boy looked down at the coin and started to bring it up to his face… 

As it neared his chin the boat unexpectedly shook ferociously and Charon grabbed onto his lower arms to stop him from stumbling and falling into the water. 

“DEAN! DON’T YOU DO IT! DON’T YOU-“ But the familiar voice was silenced within seconds by the splashing of water and all that could be heard in it's wake was a small gargling yell as it was pushed down into the river. 

Dean slowly cast his eyes to the side of the boat where he saw three of the twisted spirits holding something under the surface, something that was fighting desperately to get free. Their sunken-in faces looked up at the boy blankly as Charon tugged at his arms with urgency . 

“Now Dean or I swear your father will die before you.” Snarled the old man viciously into the boy's terrified face. 

Water rose in his throat once more but Charon’s venomous threat tore through everything, shocking him into clarity.

The creature had made all this happen, he had chose Dean, marked him with the coin, broke into their room, attacked Sam, drowned Dean, tortured him with his mother, and now he was killing his father in front of him. 

It was hopeless, what choice did he have really? _What choice did he ever have?_ He was trapped, and he always would be. 

  


Dean knew one thing though, he couldn’t let his father die. It was his job to protect his family and the thought of Sammy completely alone in the world caused tears to appear in the corners of his eyes. No, he had to stop this. His father didn’t deserve to die for his indecisiveness.

The boy took a deep steadying breath, trying to repress the water that attempted to force its way out of his lungs, and looked up at Charon and saw the sick twisted grin he had plastered on his ancient face. He knew he had won now and he wasn’t even trying to hide it. 

  


White hot anger burned through Dean and clouded his vision. He didn’t know what kind of domino effect that this one random act would create... But he did it anyway out pure rage and desperation. 

  


Using his last ounce of strength against the old man, hoping that it would catch him off guard, Dean shook his hands free of Charon’s grip and grabbed the old man’s straggly grey hair- pulling the ancient face closer to him…

  


Charon grunted in surprise when Dean slammed his palm, which still held the coin that he had given to him, straight over the man’s mouth. The small silver disc fell from Dean's hand and lodged it's self into the daimōn's rotten throat, then the boy removed his arm and quickly forced Charon's startled mouth closed. 

The old man stumbled backwards as Dean released him and for a split second the child thought that all he had succeeded in doing was pissing Charon off even further. 

But as Dean watched on in horror the creature started to shake violently and desperately started to grab at his throat. His eyes opened wide in shock and displayed the awful fleshy pink of his empty left eye socket. In response the boat that they both stood upon on started to crack and crumble underneath Dean’s feet and Charon began to growl and scream as he tried to dislodge the coin from his throat. The boy watched the awful spectacle with terror in his eyes as the daimōn flung his head back and opened his mouth wide to scream.

The fierce red light emitted from his throat as he yelled in pain. The light that had provided Dean with a sense of safety and comfort was now doing the exact opposite to Charon. 

The boat continued to break apart and the pitch-black water now lapped greedily around Dean’s feet. The boy looked off to the side of the damaged vessel to see that the spirits had retreated away from Charon and the boat. Their appearance had returned to the more human state Dean had first saw them in when they had peacefully circled the old man like harmless ghosts. In their arms they held an unconscious figure who was far more solid than their transparent visages. 

“D-Dad?” Dean called out to the man in a hoarse cry that he knew couldn’t travel the distance between them. But nevertheless his father started to stir and Dean felt relief flow through him, but it was soon short lived… 

The boat vibrated and broke apart with a loud crack. It should of by all means have sunk by now but Charon was still standing and Dean guessed that as long as he was still struggling for life, the remnants of the boat would remain animated by his power. The green light from his staff, that had been discarded at the bottom of the boat when he had grabbed for Dean after John somehow reached them, flickered and was now partly submerged by water. The boy also had a feeling that it was the only thing keeping the boat afloat right now. 

The ancient man had sunken to his knees as he clawed at his face and mouth, the awful noises that emitted from his throat were now becoming more raspy and strangled. The roles had been reversed, now Dean was the one who towered above his gasping body.

“Yah- Yahur- stu-“ Charon wheezed at the boy, trying to move towards him in the broken sinking boat but he got nowhere. The words were muffled by the sounds of his choking, the red light burned brighter and in turn seemed to burn Charon as smoke escaped his mouth along with a muffled yell. 

He sunk to his hands and knees and the wooden planks beneath them shuddered, Dean knew that it was going to give way soon- it’s unnatural buoyancy even in this decrepit state was finally dying with Charon. The old man angled his head up to Dean and the boy noticed that his skin had once again started to sink and that sickly green parlour had returned to it. He was reverting back to his original disgusting form that he had shown Dean in the motel mirror. 

  


“Yo- You’re st-still maaar-ked…” Gargled the decaying creature at Dean as he trembled and shook. 

  


He rose slightly and grinned his yellowed toothed smile once more as the wood beneath them sunk. 

  


  


Then finally Charon’s grotesque head dropped down into the water with a hollow splash. 

 

  


  


A small breath escaped Dean’s mouth as he prayed for it to be over. He was now up to his knees in the icy river and he was pretty sure that his exhausted body couldn’t take much more time in the water. Dean turned to look over at the spirits and his father, praying that they had let him go. 

His heart lept when he saw John's face amongst the souls watching him with tears in his tired eyes. 

“Dean! Just stay there I’ll come for you!” Called John, pulling himself free of the spirits, whose grip on him had grown more slack as he watched Charon choke from where they had dragged him to. At the moment he couldn’t care less about their sudden change of demeanor, instead John swam frantically towards his eldest son who was quickly sinking into the water. 

“Hurry!” Replied Dean wearily, he was sure that as soon as he was neck deep in water he wouldn’t be able to keep himself afloat. As he stood on shaky legs that were sinking deeper and deeper into the unforgiving river the child knew that he was barely clinging to consciousness. 

He watched his father approach and waited to be pulled into his arms and away from this seemingly never ending nightmare...

  


But the hunter was inches away from Dean when it happened. And neither of them saw it coming.

  


There was a split second where they both looked at each other with relief in their eyes, foolishly allowing themselves to believe that they had both survived. John reached out to finally wrap his arms around his boy and bring them both safely back to the riverbank… Back to Sammy who was still waiting for them in the bathroom of their motel room...

  


Then Dean vanished.

  


He was dragged savagely below the surface of the water and all that was left in front of John were ripples on the surface of the river where his son had been a moment ago.

  


Both the hunter and his eldest child had been unaware of the ancient hand that had reached out from beneath the surface. It pulled the boy down to the depths of the river in one final act of revenge.

  


  


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

  


  


_“No one interferes with my cargo or delays our voyage Dean.” Said Charon plainly. “Now I told you didn’t I? You don’t have to be willing.”_

  


  



	11. Souls That Cry For Water

* *

#  ________________

  


  


The cold tile was becoming unbearable to sit upon. 

_I’ve been here forever,_ thought Sam, _forever and ever…_

The little boy got up and pulled a towel down from the wonky rack next to the sink. He scrunched it up and placed it beneath him to create a makeshift cushion. The threadbare towel wasn’t much of an improvement on the hard tile flooring of the bathroom and it barely provided him with any comfort. 

What was that thing his Dad always said? _It’s like putting a band-aid over a shark bite?_

Sam sniffed in frustration, he felt like all he could do was put band-aids over shark bites at the moment. But the small boy didn’t allow himself to cry, instead he bent back over his coloring book and picked up a blue crayon. 

He had gotten the book five days ago when his father had taken them to a Walmart to get some supplies. They rarely ever went into huge superstores because John liked to stay away from commercialised America, he preferred gas stations and army surplus stores off the beaten track- the kind of places that embraced drifters and nomads. In those shops there were no greeters at the door and you could bet that half of their security cameras were out of action so you were certain to have an efficient anonymous shopping experience. 

None of that could be said for Walmart. John Winchester regretted stepping foot in the store when he saw his 5 year old making a B-line for the toy isle. Dean swiftly ran after him of course, but not because he was excited too- the older boy just followed to keep an eye on his brother. John had sighed heavily, forcing down a chuckle, and took the opportunity to buy what he needed in relative peace. After he’d bought some meagre supplies he headed over to the toy isle where Dean and Sam were browsing through some coloring books.

  


_“Come on boys let’s move out.” John called to his sons, already turning away- expecting them to follow. Dean moved forward, his hand snaking around Sam’s wrist to drag him on too but Sam pulled away._

_“Dad! Dad look at the books!” Cried Sam, pointing to them all feverishly, “Can I have one please? Plleeaassee?”_

_“Sammy I’ve already paid,” Sighed John wearily, “We’re going.”_

_“But this one has a dog in it!” Sam begged as he waved one of the books high above his head. “And you get crayons too! Please Dad I don’t have anything it's not fair!”_

_“Life’s not fair Sam. Stop it, come on now.”_

_“ **NO.** I want the book.” Sam stamped his foot hard on the linoleum floor and his eyes were starting to water._

_John wiped a hand over his face, he wasn’t equipped for this so he turned to the referee who stood between them, “Dean tell your brother.”_

_The older boy turned to face his father and started to bargain, “Maybe it’ll keep him happy in the car Dad, you know how bored he gets on long journeys...”_

  


And so Sam had gotten his coloring book, thanks to Dean intervention. Sam didn’t really know how to thank him, he’d offered to share the book with his brother but Dean refused- saying it was for kids. Later on though Sam caught Dean staring at the book out of the corner of his eyes with a strange look on his face which got even worse when he’d started coloring the picture of the family in the backyard. Sam didn’t know if he was jealous or what but something lingering in Dean’s face had made Sam feel sad and guilty.

The younger boy looked down at the book and realised he’d turned back to the page with the happy family. Sam had finished coloring it in ages ago and had finished several other pictures since but the book automatically turned to that page in the middle of the book because Sam had bent the spine back to keep the pages open as he colored. This was a habit that his father hated (bending books backwards to crack the spine) and Sam thought it was the reason why he never let him near any of his strange old books that he read religiously. Like Sam would ever bend the spines on those books anyway, they looked like they’d fall apart if he so much as sneezed on them. Anyway he wasn’t interested in John’s weird books at all but right now, after spending forever locked in this small bathroom, he would kill for one to read to pass the time… He’d look at anything besides this stupid childish coloring book.

Sam stared into the dumb smiling faces of the cartoon family that he’d painstakingly colored in. It was perfect. Not once had he gone over the lines, which was impressive considering that he’d spent most of his time coloring the book inside the car. He should be proud of the job he’d done. 

And yet he felt nothing but anger towards it.

Suddenly Sam grabbed the black crayon tightly in his hand and with a sharp yell the boy brought it down onto the book and started scribbling madly, trying to erase the family and cover them in the darkness that he felt. When the crayon broke into small pieces Sam just picked up the book and started to savagely tear it apart as he yelled and cried in frustration.

He hated the family and their dog and the swimming pool and the other pages of the same smiling happy people over and over again. Sam tore and tore until the whole thing was shredded into tiny pieces as tears flowed down his face and frustrated yells forced their way out of his throat.

  


Where was _his_ Dad?

Where was _his_ brother?

Where was _his_ family?

  


#  _________________________________________

  


  


One minute Dean had been right in front of him, the next he was gone. He’d been pulled back down into the river with such severity that by the time John had made to grab onto him all that had been left were bubbles on the surface of the water.

John Winchester was left in the empty silent river and couldn’t believe the nightmare wasn’t stopping.

But he wasn’t admitting defeat, not by a long shot. 5 years ago he had re-entered baby Sammy’s nursery to try and save his wife whilst fumes and flames fought against him and he didn’t leave until he couldn’t fight anymore. The hunter was going to do the same for Dean. 

Without thinking John Winchester inhaled as much air as he could and dived back into the water to save his son.

  


He could barely see a thing in the murky depths of the river besides blurry outlines tinged with green. John kicked ferociously to propel himself deeper into the river, his hands constantly racking through the water as he hoped against hope that a small hand would latch onto his. As John swam downwards he kept on mistaking plants and branches for limbs and hair, each one was a phantom Dean and a disheartening let down when he realised it wasn’t his boy. 

It didn’t take the hunter long to reach the bottom of the river and as he reached his hand out to swim forward he raked his fingertips through the moss growing on top of the sand. He pulled at it to drag him onward but upon further inspection he found that what he held onto was in fact too long and soft for moss…

It was hair.

His sluggish hands moved down to cup the face that the hair belonged to and pulled it up closer to him. John could just about make out a cold pale face of a boy and his heart skipped a beat. But the relief at finding the small body was short lived. What if it was just that? _A body._

John didn’t have time to dwell on that horrible thought right now, he was getting desperate for air in addition to being out of his mind with worry that Dean was already gone… The man knew he had to get both himself and his son to the surface right now or they both would perish. He quickly felt for his son’s arm to drag them both upwards and out of the river to safety.

John pushed up off the bottom of the river to propel themselves up but he soon found that Dean was caught on something and no matter how hard he tried to pull Dean just wouldn’t move. Frantically John swam down Dean’s body trying to feel for anything tethering him to the bottom of the river. He found nothing on his hands or waist but as he reached his sons legs he felt a bony withered hand wrapped around Dean’s ankle with a death-like grip.

It had to belong to Charon. 

Sure enough John could make out the figure of the Daimōn God floating behind Dean but thankfully he seemed to be unmoving.

John refocused on freeing Dean, trying in vain to prise the hand off Dean’s leg but quickly finding out that Charon wouldn’t budge. Panic started to cloud his brain as he suppressed the need to breathe and instead started to desperately kick at the corpse-like hand, hoping he could break a finger or two to loosen the grip. But no matter how hard he tried his foot was slowed down by the dense water and Charon’s hand just wouldn’t let go of Dean. In frustration John swam up to grab Dean’s lifeless arms and again tried to pull Dean free but it was no use. 

The need for air burnt deep in John’s chest and he couldn't help but open his mouth wide to let out a gargling scream of pain and defeat. Water flooded into his mouth and started to suffocate him, increasing his frantic panic.

He wanted to shout for Dean but the water stopped him from doing so. It was stopping everything… His vision. His breath… 

  


_His life._

  


The world was slowing and so was his brain. Out of a thousand ways he could have potentially gone out he was going to die here? In this backwater town, drowning in a murky river? It was an unfair insignificant death that nobody deserved and to make it even worse he was dooming his first born alongside him. 

One last image makes its way into his drowning mind as darkness begins to leak into the edges of his sight… 

Two small faces in the backseat of his Impala staring up at him with equal looks of disappointment.

  


_I’m so sorry boys..._

  


  


There is darkness. But then there’s light.

  


  


And suddenly, _hands…_  


  


  


They grasp his limbs gently and pull him away. Blindly he reaches out to where his son was trapped and grabs nothing but water. Faintly he realises that whoever these hands belong to they are dragging him upwards and out of the river…

Within seconds they break the surface. Cold air hits John’s face and he immediately gasps and splutters for breath. The hunter coughs out the water that had flooded into his mouth and greedily refills his lungs with air- all other rational thought was driven away as John struggled to regain the breath he’d lost.

Gradually he steadied his breathing and began to realise in his disoriented state that he was still being held afloat by the same phantom hands that he’d felt pulling him up out of the river… Up and away from his son.

“Oh god DEAN!” Rasped John and he made to dive back into the depths of the river once more. However the hands only gripped him tighter and seemed to be manoeuvring him towards something.

John tried to struggle against whoever or whatever was holding him, that is until he felt a body being pushed into his arms. His vision, which hadn’t caught up with him since he had breached the surface, finally started to focus.

John looked down and saw his son right below him, cold and unmoving, being held above the river by Charon’s spirits which had fought against him not so long ago. All of his instincts told him that he should be afraid of these monsters who had previously been twisted into the Ferryman of the Dead’s attack dogs but right now all those hateful thoughts where driven out of his mind at the sight of Dean.

“No…” John muttered in disbelief at the boy’s lifeless appearance, he pulled his son closer whilst fear rose in his stomach, “No, please don’t be…” 

The hunter moved his hand slowly and the spirits that were holding him loosened their grip to let him check his son’s pulse. 

John placed two fingers gently on Dean’s neck then let his own eyes wander up towards the night sky and silently prayed to whoever was up there.

Suddenly without warning a hand slipped over his own. John jolted in shock and looked down, expecting it to be Dean’s…

  


But instead it was one of the ethereal spirits. He found that the hand was weirdly warm and comforting. It was something he hadn’t felt in far too long and in response he followed the arm upwards to look into the owners face.

The hand belonged to a woman who John found vaguely familiar from the photograph that had accompanied one of the Missing Persons files. Her translucent face looked mournful and apologetic as she stared intently at John and it took a moment for the hunter to realise that he couldn’t stand it… Not that awful sadness that lit her opaque face… And specially not the foreboding that was in her eyes… 

“Please.” John breathed, looking her square in those wide chalky eyes, “Please don’t take him.”

The spirit tilted her head slowly as if she were processing his request. 

She let go of his hand but continued to stare benignly at John. It was then that the hunter also noticed that the other dozen spirits where staring intently at him too- but it was drastically different to the way they had glared at him when Charon had twisted them into snarling vicious ghosts… 

John payed them no mind and closed his eyes, willing a pulse into Dean’s neck- willing life back into his son.

Just when John swore that he’d felt a small pulse hands suddenly snaked around his arms and started to drag him towards land. He flung his eyes open to find that Dean was no longer floating in front of him, instead he was surrounded by Charon’s spirits who were quickly toeing him towards the muddy riverside.

“NO! LET ME GO!!” He shouted as he once again tried to frantically struggle against them. But it was useless, they were nearly at the edge of the river already.

“Where’s Dean! Where is he?!” John continued to shout in their mournful faces whilst they finally pulled him free of the river. 

“Don’t you take him… He’s not… You can’t-“ His begging was suddenly cut short as the spirits that surrounded him stepped aside to allow another one of them to enter the fray. 

  


It was the woman who had touched John’s hand, and she was carrying Dean.

  


She set him down on the muddy ground in front of John and calmly placed her palm over Dean’s forehead. The movement was loving, almost motherly, and it made John freeze in his tracks as he had nearly made to pull Dean away from the supernatural beings… But something told him to stop. After the woman bent down to place her hand calmly over Dean’s head the male spirit to her left knelt too and did the same, placing his hand over the top of the woman’s.

One by one each of Charon’s spirits rested their hands on Dean’s head and torso as John watched on, completely transfixed as to what they were doing. 

But John knew… 

They were _helping_. He could feel it.

  


And when the last spirit placed its hand on Dean’s chest they all raised their heads to look at the child’s father.

John Winchester looked back into their now peaceful faces and a flooding realisation washed over him. These were still human souls. Souls that Charon had lied to, promised them peace and rest only to condemn them to being comatose sources of power for the Daimōn himself. They had been trapped here, prevented from moving on by the very thing Dean had destroyed. His son had given them their freedom and John was pretty sure that they were currently trying to repay the favour.

He looked at the spectre of the woman once more and she stared back expectantly, as if asking for consent.

John took a deep breath that rattled in his throat. Some unspoken force told him to trust them, that they could be Dean’s only chance.

So John swallowed his ingrained doubt and simply nodded at them.

The edges of the woman’s mouth moved slightly in a small smile that was barely even noticeable. But John could hear the unsaid words that where implied in it…

  


_Thank you._

  


The faint white glow of the spirits that surrounded Dean’s motionless body started to brighten and one by one they seemed to reach a certain intensity of light that rendered their features indistinguishable. As John squinted at the bright figures he realised that they were starting to vanish and break apart, their hand’s disappeared from Dean’s body until only one remained.

It was the one who had put her hand on his son’s forehead first. The one who had given him that look of unspoken thanks… 

Her light wasn’t fading like the others. Instead the light she emitted condensed it’s self into a small glowing sphere and travelled downwards towards Dean’s chest.

It hovered above the boy for a moment, the light illuminating Dean’s soaking clothes. Then after a moment of what seemed like contemplation it sunk into his chest, right above his heart, and disappeared.

John stayed captivated throughout the entire process, not even moving a single muscle. Now that it was over he felt a stray tear run down the side of his face as the spirit’s gesture washed over him.

  


A spluttered choking abruptly shook him from his daze.

He looked down to see the shocking sight of Dean violently convulsing as he tried to dispel the water trapped in his throat and lungs. 

  


“Holy shit, _Dean._ ” John crawled towards his son in a heartbeat and turned him on his side.

“It’s okay son, it’s okay…” He rubbed encouraging circles around Dean’s back as he continued to vehemently cough out water, “Just breathe, take your time… Oh thank God you’re… It’s okay I got you...”

Even though Dean was suffering John couldn’t help but feel relief at the sight and feel of his son’s moving body. He was alive, he had survived this torturous night. Now all that mattered was getting Dean back to the motel room where Sam was hopefully still safely locked up in the bathroom waiting for them.

As Dean’s hacking coughs subdued, his body started to shake with cold. John manoeuvred him into a sitting position and wished that he had something better to cover his son’s feeble frame up with than his own damp jacket. For a moment he sat there clutching onto Dean like he was afraid he would disappear again but the severity of Dean’s shakes and the chattering of his teeth made John realise that they needed to get Dean out of here and into the warmth. 

But first he needed to walk them back to the motel, maybe back to the car…

 _Yes…_ The car could give out heat like a damn furnace- John could run back, drive it up here-

 _Oh that car of yours can drive through a forest full of trees can it Winchester?_ Came a voice from deep within his head, one that sounded so playfully exasperated yet loving at the same time.

_Shit. You got me there Mary._

She always kept him on the straight and narrow. It was no wonder that he was sat here in the slippery mud of the river side with their most likely hypothermic eldest son without her here. 

But her voice had the same effect that it always did, it brought him to his senses. John knew that he had to carry his son back through the woods and into the Impala- then pray to God that nothing else went wrong.

He may have faith in his family, but he didn’t have as much faith in their rotten luck.

“Dean, I’m going to get you warm alright?” John said as he shifted Dean around until he had his arms underneath him ready to haul his son up bridal style. “Gonna get you back to the car and we’ll blast the heat as high as we can, dry you straight through. You’ll be fine I promise.”

As John lifted his son up Dean started to weakly grab at his father’s jacket as if trying to get his attention. John looked down at him for a moment, registering the blue tinge to his lips that were currently opening and closing- making it appear as if Dean was trying to speak, yet no sound was coming out.

“Don’t worry little man,” John tried to comfort the 9 year old whilst he started to walk into the dark woods once again, “We’ll be back before you know it.”

Having abandoned his weapons and more importantly his flashlight by the side of the river during his face off with Charon (and with zero time to collect them all), John had no defence against anything that might dare to come for him and his son whilst he weaved as quickly as he could through the small forest. The hunter blindly bumped into tree trunks and shrubbery, almost tripping once or twice on rogue stones or tree roots, but throughout what felt like a lengthy death-march John kept as tight a grip on a shivering Dean as he could. 

Then finally, just when John had started to feel his feet starting to betray him, the trees appeared to be thinning. As he willed himself onward the hunter started to notice the welcoming electric blue glow of their motel's neon sign leaking between the trees. 

John’s feet hit solid concrete and he found himself on the sidewalk of The Riverbed Motel still holding on tightly to his son. 

  


They were greeted with no fanfare, no welcome committee or even what would be the welcome sight of an ambulance… Instead there was nothing, not a person insight. The stuttering blue light just continued to illuminate the parking lot as it had done in their absence and would no doubt continue to do so after they were long gone. 

  


Not a soul out here seemed to care about their sudden appearance from out of the woods. But John knew a certain 5 year old who would.

  



	12. On the Heaven's Side of Another Wide River to Cross

* 

#  ________________

  


  


_There was a lady here in the white air along side him. A lady with yellow hair and a soft voice. So familiar yet so unknown. She held him close in her warm strong embrace and he felt like nothing could hurt him. They were both safe and she was singing…_

_Singing a song Sam had heard before. But sung by someone else._

_Then she whispered to him lovingly... Calling his name..._

_“Sam…”_

_“Sammy…”_

  


**“SAMMY!”**

  


The loud voice of his father shook him from his sleep. Sam woke up to the sound of pounding on the bathroom door and he blinked twice before prying his face of the cold tiles and peeled two pieces of his torn-up coloring book off his cheek. When all sense and worry flooded back into him the boy quickly jumped up to unlock the door without hesitation even as stars danced in his vision.

When he flung the door open he was pulled into a frantic hug, one which was incredibly crushing and damp. Sam just about had time to register that the clothes that belonged to the man who was holding him were soaked through before he abruptly let the young boy go.

A heavy hand landed on his shoulder and Sam looked up into his father's face. The sight of him was actually quite terrifying. The man had a particularly bad slashes across his cheek that were strangely bloodless, mud sporadically covered his body, there was pieces of grass and moss in his knotted hair and his eyes were bloodshot red.

Sam stumbled backwards. His father looked just like Charon had when he’d caught a glimpse of him in their mirror, like a creature of the deep.

  


The small child wanted nothing more than to run and hide back under the bed again.

  


“Hey hey Sammy it’s me.” Said John as he tried to wipe some of the mud off his face and winced as he caught one of the deeper cuts. “Come on you gotta help me here.”

“W-Where’s Dean?” Sam stuttered as he looked behind the figure of his father, hoping with all his heart to see his big brother standing there… But instead he found himself peering into an empty room. 

The 5 year old couldn’t help the tears that started to pool in his eyes in fear of what that absence meant.

“Don’t worry I got him Sammy. Dean’s fine.” Reassured the man. Then he suddenly shot up as if remembering another task he needed to do. He headed for Sam and Dean’s bags that had mercifully been left on top of the small table and not on the floor that was still wet from the water that Charon had so helpfully flooded the room with. “He just… He was in the water a long time and almost— But he’s in the car right now getting warmed up we just need to get him into some new clothes...”

John rifled through the duffel and pulled out a sweatshirt and jeans that were way to small.

“That’s- That’s mine.” Mumbled Sam as he meekly watched the man from the doorway of the bathroom, still not ready to trust him.

“What?” He asked back, freezing on his way out the door.

“That’s my clothes.” Said Sam and slowly made his way to the table himself.

When he reached the table he stood on the other side facing the man then pulled one of the chairs out so that he could climb up to reach into the other bag.

“This is Dean’s.” The boy said quietly as he pulled out a plaid shirt and a Metallica band tee that was way too big for his brother- but he still wore it anyway. 

The tired man looked at the clothes and his mouth turned up slightly in a small smile that seemed to be hiding a sob. “Sorry Sammy, it’s just been…” He reached for the clothes that Sam held in his hand, “- I’m not thinking straight.” 

The small boy climbed down from the unstable chair before John could take Dean’s clothes from him. 

“I wanna see him.” Sam demanded as he heard the man sigh in exasperation.

“Sam he’s not well, like I said he needs heat right now and a change of clothes.” John was now riffling through the correct duffel bag as he tried to reason with his younger son who was acting very strangely around him. It should have worried him more and maybe he should have addressed it but right now he couldn’t ease Sam’s fears, not when he was still afraid for Dean who was waiting in the superficial warmth that the car’s heat could give him. 

“God why the hell don’t we have a thermal blanket?” He muttered to himself as he pulls out any items of Dean’s clothing that felt thick, wishing that he was more prepared for this entire situation and making mental notes that they, both he _and_ his sons, mustn’t be caught off guard again. 

There is very little to choose from and as John stares down at all worn out and almost thread-bare clothes shame starts to choke him. 

_Why the hell don’t we have anything?_ John asked himself. But really, he knew the answer to that question. It had all started five years ago and it showed no sign of stopping anytime soon, no matter how much he hoped it would.

  


The sound of the door slamming shut abruptly shook John from his morose thoughts.

  


He looked down to find that Sam is nowhere to be found. The hunter sighs deeply and just hauls Dean’s duffel up like he should have done in the first place and heads outside after his youngest son.

It doesn’t take long to find Sam again. He stood on the raised sidewalk directly in front of the Impala and was staring into the car with a mixed expression on his small face that John could read perfectly.

Sammy looked relived to see Dean inside the car but also worried at his appearance and current state, John knew because he felt exactly the same way too.

  


Dean sat across the front two seats, his chest rising and falling weakly. His clothes were now less glossy than they had been when he was drenched through, making him look less like a ghost of a drowned child. However his jacket and t-shirt were starting to dry stiffly and revealed the mud and ripped holes that littered his clothing. The yellow light that lit up the car should have at least given the boy some color, albeit artificial, but instead it only highlighted how pale and blue tinged his skin was. The 9 year old still shivered as he pulled himself tighter into a foetal position, wrapping his feeble shaking arms around his knees. Dean hadn’t spotted his younger brother yet, he just hid his head and continued to shake despite the heat in the car, it was on so high that Sam could hear the rattle of their imprisoned Lego bricks in the vents.

  


The young boy nearly jumped out of his skin when a heavy hand landed on his shoulder. He looked up with watery eyes at the man who was also staring into the car with a tight grimace, like the site was paining him as well as Dean. Suddenly there was no doubt in Sam’s mind that it was his father and he felt stupid for even thinking that it wasn’t.

“Come on Sammy.” John said softly, guiding his son towards the passenger side. Sam was still to small to see inside the side window but the older man opened the car door to reveal Dean.

Whether or not Dean had flinched at the familiar creak of the door was hard to tell considering how much he was shivering.

“Hey dude, me and Sammy have brought you some dry clothes.” Coaxed John. However, it turned out Dean didn’t need much coaxing. At the sound of Sam’s name Dean frantically untangled himself and turned to look at his brother who stood holding his plaid flannel and Metallica t-shirt. 

He gazed at Sam in disbelief, his eyes went wide and a smile nearly made it’s way onto his trembling lips. 

Before John could stop him, Sam climbed up into the car and threw his small arms around Dean's neck.

“Sammy,” He heard his father say from behind him, “Let’s just get him better for now okay?”

The younger boy sniffed and let go of Dean, but before he could climb out of the car so John could see to his brother his feeble shaking hand latched around Sam’s wrist. He looked back at the older boy to see Dean slowly open his mouth in an attempt at speech… But nothing was coming out.

  


Sam watched him open and shut his trembling mouth, even closing his eyes in what seemed like concentration. A moment later he tried again but still no sound escaped him. 

  


Tears started to fill Dean’s green terrified eyes as he opened his mouth to no avail.

His younger brother suddenly held onto him again to try and ease his worry.

“It’s okay Dean. We’ll fix everything.” Murmured Sam into Dean’s damp jacket as the other boy shivered and silently sobbed beneath him. 

  


“Dad got you back and we’ll fix you.”

  


  


 

#  _________________________________________

  


  


 

“He can’t speak Bobby!” Cried John down the receiver. He was restlessly pacing up and down the sidewalk just outside their motel room, kicking stray rocks in anger with his worn-out boots in the light of the afternoon sun. “He just opens his mouth and no sound comes out. What if he never talks again!”

“John he-” Came the grouchy voice of Bobby Singer from the other end. He’d tried and failed to get a word in edge ways throughout John’s feverish account of the last night and subsequent morning.

“Could it be shock or the water? Maybe it's something Charon did to him that I didn't see?” John wondered, more voicing his thoughts out loud than asking a question considering he didn’t wait for an answer, “I mean the kid nearly drowned- nearly died- ”

“John just-“

“-facing that monster alone maybe… Or the coin he was holding... But he stopped speaking after the fire Bobby, he didn’t speak for weeks! Jesus Christ I never want to go through that-”

“JOHN I SWEAR TO GOD YOU NEED TO LET _**ME** _SPEAK!” Bobby finally yelled down the receiver in frustration, stopping John’s rambling tirade.__

____

Suddenly he was met with silence and for a moment Bobby thought the line had gone dead.

“Hello? You still there?”

“Yeah. I’m just letting you speak.” Came John’s disgruntled reply.

“Smart ass.” Grumbled Bobby, “Anyway as I was trying to say, if you’d stop confusing me with your therapist for one second, is that Dean will be able to speak again in three days.”

“ _What?_ ” Snapped John disbelievingly at such a precise answer. “How the hell do you know?”

“I pulled it outta thin air, what do you think?” Bobby retorted and the sound of turning pages could be heard over the phone, “It’s in the lore ya idjit if you even bothered to read.”

“Yeah you’re right I should have checked the mobile hunter’s library before I called you.” Replied John with equal amounts of sarcasm. But he stopped his pacing to listen to Bobby speak. “So what do the books say?”

“They say that no mortal can hear the condemned’s voice until they are purified from their consecration to the Lower Gods, and until the third dawn has risen.” Came Bobby’s worldly voice and John couldn’t help but be unnerved by some of his phrasing.

“Condemned?” He asked worriedly as he peered into the window of their motel room. Dean was currently laying in the middle of the bed in around six layers of clothing, not to mention all the blankets that covered him, staring at Sam whilst his little brother attempted to read to him from a comic book.

“Don’t worry he’s not condemned no more.” Reassured Bobby, “But his soul was almost taken John, by a very powerful daimōn. He just needs time to recover.”

“And purify?”

“Well that’s what this ancient rag says, no mention of a ritual or nothing. I say we wait three days and hope that he starts talking. And until then…. he’s alive isn’t he?”

“Yeah.” Sighed John, he looked at his sons again and become a little misty-eyed. “He’s alive.”

“Well then I’d reckon we have a lot to be thankful for.” Said Bobby, not knowing how right he was.

“It was all him in the end Bobby.” John murmured as tears threatened to choke him, still seeing a close-to-drowning Dean attacking Charon with what little fight was left in him whenever he closed his eyes, “I was powerless but Dean… He fought Charon and won- grabbed him and forced that coin down his throat, used one of the old man's weapons against him just when I thought..." The hunter let his voice trail off.

“Tough kid you’ve got there John.” Bobby added, the older man's pride was evident even through the phone.

“The toughest.” Agreed the other hunter. He glanced at his younger son whose face was currently scrunched up and staring hard at the comic book as if he was stuck on a really hard word. 

“And Sammy, he held his own too you know.” John smiled as he watched Sam give up and turn the page. Suddenly the realisation of how strong his kids had become choked him up, he was so proud yet so saddened by the fact that they needed to be strong in the first place.

“They both held it together much better than their old man did...” Said John, his grip loosening on the phone as the events of the night washed over him in a great crushing wave, “God I left them to fend for themselves Bobby, if I’d-”

He nearly broke down at the vast pain of his guilt but Bobby brought him back down to earth. He could always count on Singer for a good dose of reality. 

“Listen John,” Came that no nonsense voice, “You can blame yourself 'till the cows come home but it ain’t going to get you anywhere. You just look after those boys okay? Number one priority right now.”

“Damn straight.” Agreed John as he ran a tired hand over his face, “And err... Thanks Bobby.”

“Jeeze, a thank you as well? You going soft?”

John chuckled softly, “Never.” 

“Three days John.” Repeated Bobby, “You call me if anything happens.”

“Yeah. See you round old man.” John smirked as he pressed end call knowing that he’d pay for that last remark. Singer hadn’t quite gotten around to shooting him down with his handy shotgun just yet but there was still time.

  


There was still time for a lot of things.

  


The hunter reluctantly turned away from their motel room window and walked towards the Impala. He ran his hand lovingly across the hood to the silver door handle and opened it with that same comforting creak. John stood up tall and looked across her roof out into the parking lot that was still as abandoned as it had been all night, apart from the 1985 Ford Escape parked right next to the exit waiting for the same woman he’d seen yesterday climbing out of a different car with a smeared face of make-up. He sighed knowing full well he couldn’t help that girl from her own demons and climbed into the driver’s side. Once inside he took a deep breath and let his head rest on the steering wheel for a moment.

John hadn’t mentioned to Bobby what the spirits had done to bring Dean back. He didn’t really know why, something just choked him up when he neared that part of the story. In the end the hunter had only given Bobby a brief over view of what had happened as after all, words couldn’t really convey what John had seen let alone what his boys had been through. Maybe a part of John didn’t want to relive the panic and terror… But another part was slightly worried about how the spirits had revived Dean… Was it natural? Had Dean really been gone by the time the ghosts had used their own souls to bring him back?

But the bigger question was, should he even care? Like Bobby had said his son was _alive_ , unable to speak at the moment but living and breathing lying on a bed with Sammy happily reading comics to him. He should be nothing but thankful. The moment he arrived at that river last night to see Charon towering over Dean’s lifeless body he had thought he may never see that sight again.

  


John wanted to start the car, go for a drive somewhere to clear his head, but he was worried that if he started to drive he may never stop.

  


Instead he reached into the back of the car and felt around for the police files that he’d abandoned yesterday and could help feeling guilt at the fact that if he’d actually worked the case harder in the first place perhaps he could have caught Charon before he got to Dean. He also regretted that he didn’t beat the life out of Charon like he'd wanted to when he had appeared at the Impala’s window and had essentially marked Dean for slaughter without John even knowing… He should never have just marked him off as a desperate homeless man, but in his line of work he had to be careful… You start seeing evil everywhere eventually that is all you see.

John left much older than his 34 years and the past five years that he'd lived through had felt like a hundred. As he looked through the missing person case files once more he sympathised with the pain of each victim for whom death in the form of Charon didn’t grant them the oblivion they wanted, and their fate could have easily befallen his eldest son too.

As he carefully opened the second file the attached paperclipped photograph that accompanied the report fell off and landed in his lap. He looked down at the black and white image of a mournful looking woman with kind eyes.

John picked up the photograph and held it up into the light, gazing at the picture intently…

  


It was the spirit who had carried Dean out of the river, who had used her soul to wake his son.

  


In a daze John leafed through her documents to discover her name was Juliet Rodriguez, she was originally from South Dakota but had moved to Minnesota eleven years ago. Her only next of kin listed in her file was her son, Daniel. However, John soon found a death certificate in her paperwork that stated that he had died in 1982 aged 7. The hunter didn’t look at the cause of death, preferring not to know... Everything he read hit a little too close to home. 

He stared at Juliet’s photograph once again, now understanding that she and the other spirits had helped them not only for revenge against Charon, but to help Dean live when they could not.

 

* * * * * * * *

  


Two mud covered combat boots stepped out of the jet black car and walked towards a barely standing metal bench at the end of the motel’s building. The owner of the boots carried 3 heavy classified police files in one hand and a lighter in the other. He sat down on the bench and looked out onto The Riverbed Motel’s deserted parking lot and flipped the lighter on.

  


He burnt the photographs first. Even if anyone could see him setting the paper on fire he doubted that anyone in this town would stop him.

  


After letting the ashes of the photographs fall to the ground beneath him he then dropped the files into the trash can next to him, along with a large helping of lighter fluid.

  


As he stood up he dropped his lighter in the trash too, letting the flames hungrily eat up the rest of the paper. It was the only burial that the missing would have.

  


John Winchester didn’t look back at the fire. Instead he walked up to the door of Room No.34 and stared at the crooked golden numbers.

  


He heard a small solitary voice speaking to his older brother from inside the room and smiled.

  


  


_Three days,_ he told himself, _then maybe I’ll hear two._

  


* 

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S OVER!!! HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!
> 
> I hope you enjoyed reading this monster of a fic that was never meant to be this long! Thank you beautiful reader you deserve a medal ❤
> 
> Took me too long to finish this so I thought that posting two chapters might be a good apology. I tend to write myself into a hole (a lot like the writers do on the _actual_ show haha) then it takes me ages to pull myself out of it and write decent an ending after all the build up! And God was that ending a long time coming SO AGAIN thanks for sticking with it!!
> 
>  
> 
> And also below I've listed the songs that every chapter gets it's title from, each one is a lyric taken from these awesome songs:
> 
> Chapter 1: **Conrad** by Ben Howard
> 
> Chapter 2 & 3: **Charon** by Keaton Henson
> 
> Chapter 4: **Muddy Waters** by Johnny Cash
> 
> Chapter 5: **Hinnom, TX** by Bon Iver
> 
> Chapter 6: **Flume** by Bon Iver
> 
> Chapter 7: **Blindsided** by Bon Iver
> 
> Chapter 8: **Hard Enough** by Brandon Flowers
> 
> Chapter 9: **Charon** by Symphony X 
> 
> Chapter 10: **Conrad** by Ben Howard (again)
> 
> Chapter 11: **Cool Water** by Hank Williams Jr
> 
> Chapter 12: **Another Wide River to Cross** by Johnny Cash
> 
>  
> 
> ***also the 3 days until Dean can speak again was not pulled out of thin air as Bobby quite rightly says, it again comes from the play **Alcestis** By **Euripides** which this fic is very _very_ loosely based on.


End file.
